The future of Douglas County with the Tri-County Department of Health is once again being questioned after a senior official told Castle Rock leaders this week that the county will “continue” with the formation of its own health agency until the beginning of 2023.
The news comes six months after Douglas County first declared that it would leave Tri-County Health following the agency’s decision to order masks to contain the spread of COVID-19. The guideline, along with others to shut down restaurants and businesses, was seen by many in the conservative county south of Denver as an oppressive government gone mad.
Douglas County softened its position in November, telling Tri-County Health that it was terminating its notice to withdraw from the agency of which it is a member for 73 years – at least until the end of 2022 – while continuing to “examine its partnership. “
But on Tuesday, Castle Rock city manager Dave Corliss shared an update with Douglas County Manager Doug DeBord with the city council, stating that “the current direction to establish a separate health department in County Douglas will proceed, with the likely full implementation scheduled for January 1, 2023. ”
“So this represents Doug’s understanding of the opinions of his county commissioners,” Corliss told the council.
Castle Rock’s elected leaders, who spent part of Tuesday’s meeting discussing whether to form their own public health department for the city of 65,000, voted 6-1 to draft a resolution urging Douglas County to “extradite” its break with the county of Tri.
The dispute between Douglas County and Tri-County Health echoes the familiar push and pull that occurred across the state in 2020 between Republican-biased counties and health officials over how to strictly enforce restrictions and closures.
People resisted orders to close deals or wear masks – or openly challenged in the case of Weld County – on the grounds that they were costly and a unique response to a dynamic situation.
“We don’t have a strategy and plan to reopen and remove the restrictions (COVID-19),” said Castle Rock councilman Kevin Bracken. “Our business is closed, lives are being ruined and we cannot get direct answers. People are upset – that’s why we want to move out of Tri-County. “
Douglas County downplayed the words of the county manager, telling The Denver Post that it held the position it had taken in November. The county still needs to do a feasibility analysis to “assess what best meets the public health needs of our citizens,” he said in a statement assigned to the three county commissioners.
Meanwhile, Tri-County Deputy Health Director Jennifer Ludwig said she did not see DeBord’s assessment of the situation this week as “a renewed effort … to break with the agency.”
“We knew all along that Douglas County was likely to conduct an assessment to assess what would best suit the county’s public health needs,” she said.
The tension between Douglas County and the Tri-County Department of Health, which provides public health services to more than 1.5 million people in Douglas, Arapahoe and Adams counties, increased almost as soon as the coronavirus arrived, in March.
Just a few weeks after the pandemic began, Republican state legislators in Douglas County asked commissioners to sever ties with Tri-County Health after the agency issued an order to stay at home.
Then, in May, C&C Coffee and Kitchen in Castle Rock opened its doors to a crowd of mostly unmasked customers, defying Colorado public health orders. The restaurant’s commercial license was suspended and the owners filed a lawsuit against Governor Jared Polis and state health officials.
Recently, in November, Tri-County Health temporarily closed five restaurants in Douglas County that were open in violation of public health orders that prevented dining in person.
These feelings were again exhibited during the Castle Rock City Council meeting this week, with Mayor Jason Gray saying that an autonomous county health department would be more responsive to the situation in the county in Douglas than an extensive agency like Tri -County Health.
“We have a healthier population, we don’t have a dense population, we have less population,” he said, comparing Douglas County to its northern neighbors. “We are just different.”
Castle Rock Councilman Tim Dietz said he would like to see city leaders across Douglas County join a board of directors for a new county health agency to “keep health workers in check”.
“Eventually, there must be some kind of ‘enough, enough’,” he said. “I think people are a little exhausted and really care about it and want something done. They want their business open. “