Lynch said the veto is something that “should never be done loosely,” but he cited overwhelming reaction in the community to changing the city’s system of elections — especially during the coronavirus pandemic.
Beshear largely rebuffed Republican legislators' suggestions that his limits on activity be reduced in areas that have low infection rates, saying the virus can spread too quickly for that.
Mike Clark, head of the University of Kentucky’s Center for Business and Economic Research, said while the jobless rate has returned to pre-pandemic levels, it doesn’t indicate the state’s economy has returned to normal.
During his daily briefing Monday, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said the two most prominent causes of new virus clusters in Kentucky are vacation travel and gatherings without social distancing.
For now, Kentucky limits bars and restaurants to 50% capacity and allows gatherings of up to 50 people. But the governor said Sunday that he would have to take action in response to a surge of daily new cases, particularly the new record set Sunday.
An analysis by Hoptown Chronicle shows that by mid-to-late May, visits to many public places appeared to return to pre-coronavirus levels. It was followed by a spike in local cases.
Sunday's 979 new cases pushed the state's seven-day rolling average to 547 cases, up from 447 yesterday; it has more than doubled in the last two weeks. Beshear said 30 of Sunday's new cases were in children under age 5.
“We’ve got to be careful. We’ve got to make sure that we are wearing our facial coverings, because today’s cases are a reflection of 14 days ago, before we mandated those. This is what it’s going to take if we want to save our economy and save lives and get our kids back in school; it’s really that simple.” — Gov. Andy Beshear
