By Cecilia Nasmith
With provincial direction closing indoor recreational facilities due to increasing risk from the COVID-19 Omicron variant, Cobourg Chief Administrative Officer Tracey Vaughan said at this week's committee-of-the-whole council meeting that the outdoor skating rink in Cobourg's Waterfront Park becomes all the more important.
To ensure it remains open, Vaughan urged everyone to keep in mind new restrictions on outdoor gatherings to 10 people, adding her hope that large numbers of spectators would not gather to watch the skaters in close proximity to each other.
Councillor Emily Chorley agreed, asking if there was any progress on the idea first mentioned last year of a second outdoor rink. Vaughan said staff have been working on it with a Sinclair Park site in mind.
“Up until now, we have had fairly interesting weather patterns, which is very challenging with the creation of a foundation layer of ice and the maintenance of that ice,” she said.
“But absolutely we are talking about it, we are thinking about it.”
On a day when Northumberland County reported 618 currently active cases, Vaughan noted that the Emergency Control Group has returned to thrice-weekly meetings “to ensure we are responding and reacting to the constantly changing conditions.
“There's lots of change – that seems to be our only constant.”
In response to exploding case numbers and the latest provincial direction, Vaughan said that municipal buildings have closed again to walk-in traffic. The services that would have been provided on these premises must now be accessed through other means such as e-mail and telephone.
And the town must do all it can to support those staff as they work from home – in many cases, balancing their work with the needs of children facing a couple additional weeks of virtual schooling.
The mass-immunization clinic set up at the Cobourg Community Centre by the Haliburton Kawartha Pine Ridge District Health Unit has expanded, Vaughan added. The seven evening sessions offered last month resulted in 2,090 additional vaccinations.
“And we are fortunate that, at the current time, Northumberland Hills Hospital has not yet seen an increase in ICU admissions due to the variant.”
