Mecklenburg health director considers ‘shelter in place’ order. Does she have the power?
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story overstated the authority of the county’s health director to implement a shelter-in-place order. The story also misstated who hired the health director
In response to the coronavirus crisis, Mecklenburg County gyms, health clubs and theaters have been ordered to close.
The order didn’t come from the president or governor. Instead it came from Gibbie Harris, the county’s public health director.
Harris already restricted the size of public gatherings to 50 people or less.
Gov. Roy Cooper had banned gatherings of more than 100 but state health officials have since endorsed the 50-person ban first recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The governor has not ordered the closure of gyms, health clubs or theaters.
“She’s doing an outstanding job,” commissioners’ Chairman George Dunlap said Wednesday. “She’s very thoughtful about the steps she takes.”
Harris was hired by and reports to County Manager Dena Diorio. Though normally low-profile, county health directors like Harris have sweeping authority under state law.
In a blog, Norma Houston of UNC’s School of Government said local health directors have “independent authority at the local level to order quarantine and isolation and enforce communicable disease control measures.”
“At the local level,” she wrote, “the authority to order quarantine or isolation is vested solely in the local health director; a city or county cannot itself order a quarantine or isolation under a local state of emergency.”
Specifically, the law says, the “local health director (is) empowered to exercise quarantine and isolation authority . . . so long as the public health is endangered.”
But Harris doesn’t yet have the authority to order people to shelter in place, a possibility she mentioned to county commissioners Tuesday night.
“If the state determines that an action is a required communicable disease control measure, then local health directors would implement that within their jurisdictions,” said Jill Moore, a public health law expert at UNC’s School of Government. “At present the communicable control measures for COVID 19 do not in include shelter in place orders.”
Kevin Leonard, executive director of the N.C. Association of County Commissioners, said the director’s authority is “a great benefit in the structure in North Carolina of our local governments.”
“If you want to see how government works at its best watch local government work in a crisis situation because these are the folks on the front lines,” he said.
In addition to Harris’s closing of gyms, health clubs and theaters, Cooper ordered bars and restaurants closed this week to most customers; restaurants are allowed only take-out and delivery.
Sheltering in place would be even more restrictive.
In California seven San Francisco area counties have ordered their 7 million residents to stay home and go out only for “essential needs” until at least April 7, according to the Los Angeles Times. The orders have the force of law. Violators can get citations.
Dunlap said he hopes that doesn’t have to happen in Mecklenburg.
“The hope,” he said, “is that things that have already been put in place have stopped the spread (of the virus) or at least slowed it down to the point we don’t have to do that.”.
This story was originally published March 18, 2020 at 4:16 PM.
