Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Wednesday: “The local governments must do compliance. I’ve said that a number of times. It is a State law and the localities must enforce it. The localities — they have to enforce the state law. And they’re not doing it with enough diligence. Period. It is not up to them to say, “Well we’re not going to enforce the mask ordinance, we’re going to offer a mask.” It’s too late in the game to do that. We have done all the public information on masks that you can. We have done dozens of mask public service announcements. Dozens of celebrities. We’ve spent millions of dollars doing television ads on masks. It is not a function for the local government to say to someone, “It would be nice if you wore a mask. Can I give you a mask?” We’re passed that point. That’s not compliance. That is public education. We’re past public education. We’ve been doing this since February. It’s not about public education. Enforce the law. The local governments failure to enforce the law has exacerbated this problem. They’ve made it worse, not better. It’s not that people don’t know there’s a mask ordinance, they know there’s a mask law, they’re defying the law and that’s when you need to enforce the law.”
