Kanawha County Commission and City of Charleston React to Governor Extending COVID-19 Executive Order to Include Kanawha County

Saturday night, Governor Jim Justice announced that he was adding Kana-wha County to his COVID-19 Executive Order which would list Kanawha as a “hot spot” for the coronavirus due to the fact that Kanawha makes up one of the six counties that accounts for 50% of the total positive cases in the State. 

The Executive Order limits the number of people in groups to five while socially distancing and directs all essential businesses to limit the number of persons entering their establishments and requires employees to work from home to the maximum extent possible. 

“The Kanawha-Charleston Health Department will work to follow the guidelines of the execu-tive order and establish the social distancing and maximum occupancy requlations for the es-sential businesses,” stated Dr. Sherri Young, Chief Health Officer for Kanawha-Charleston Health Department. 

Commission President Kent Carper stated, “The number of positive cases of coronavirus has continued to increase in Kanawha County. Stay at home orders have been issued, but we con-tinue to see people congregating, The executive order will help the Health Department regu-late the appropriate procedures to stop the spread of the virus and provide additional re-sources, including the National Guard to help with logistics,” stated Commission President Kent Carper. 

Commissioner Ben Salango commented, “We must stop the community spread of this virus. This order provides the Health Department with more power to enforce regulations that will limit the number of persons that can congregate as well as those that will be working at essen-tial businesses.” 

“We need everyone’s help to keep the spread of the virus down. Everyone should listen to the advice of the medical professionals, practice social distancing and continue to check in on their neighbors,” stated Mayor Amy Shuler Goodwin.