Coronavirus Latest: Brandon Scott Supports Release Of More Specific Data On COVID-19 Patients, Releases Plan To Support Baltimore Economy, Residents
BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- City Council President Brandon Scott unveiled his plan lined with legislative proposals for the city to support Baltimore during and after COVID-19, and addressed the current call for the state health department to break down COVID-19 data by race and zip code at a press conference Tuesday morning.
The proposal focuses on specific support strategies for citizens, including expanding unemployment insurance as people continue to lose their jobs temporarily or permanently due to the coronavirus.
He is also pushing to use the rainy day fund to stabilize the city as he said the city is projected to lose nearly $170 million in revenue.
"The Rainy Day Fund is meant for emergencies like this one and should be used to ease the financial hardships facing our most vulnerable residents," the council president said.
Other measures included using public health experts to better leverage local public health assets, addressing housing insecurity and homelessness and working to support businesses while also working with the community, nonprofits and institutions to get the resources people need to them efficiently.
"We need to prioritize increased testing and to do it through a lens of equity," He said. "We know that COVID-19 can spread from people that show no symptoms, we know that black and brown residents are disproportionately at risk in low-income areas and also in neighborhoods where we know health disparities existed long before COVID-19."
He said if they couldn't understand and attack the virus in that manner, they wouldn't be "doing justice' for the citizens of Baltimore.
"No one, no one should be left behind in this crisis," He said.
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If a portion of the rainy fund were to be used, he is calling for $10 million to be used to establish a loan fund for businesses in Baltimore, $8 million for workforce development as the city deals with layoffs and $4 million for non-profits and cultural institutions, including art, music, theater and cultural communities through a grant program.
He addressed Del. Mosby's letter sent with 80 other legislators to the governor's administration on Monday, saying having the data broken down even more is "a matter of life and death," and while he believes the information coming out at the state level "is great," breaking it down by jurisdiction and zip code is important in order to address it now to make the most impact.
"We've seen in other places around the country already who are putting this data out, how this virus is impacting African Americans at a higher rate, because you have to consider the history of our cities, our country, on how the cities and these neighborhoods where black people live, people are already exposed to these pre-existing conditions from asthma to everything else," He said. "We cannot attack this issue without understanding and looking at it through a lens of racial equity."
Del. Mosby and other state legislators are calling for Gov. Hogan to tell the Maryland Department of Health to release COVID-19 data in Maryland by race and zip codes.
"If we're going to attack this public health pandemic, one like we've never seen before, we cannot do that properly without considering what has already happened in Baltimore," Scott said.
The city council president also jabbed at President Donald Trump and national leadership, saying the administration has "fumbled the ball,"
"Our folks are doing a great job we just have to push and go further, and we're all going to continue to advocate that we have more testing, nowhere in the United States has the amount of testing needed, and the leader of this country should be embarrassed that the wealthiest country in the history of the world was not prepared in the way that they should have been because they simply didn't take this seriously," Scott said.
There are 4,371 cases of coronavirus in Maryland, according to numbers released by the state Tuesday morning, and 103 have died from COVID-19. Nine of those deaths were Baltimore City residents, with a total of 459 cases in the city.
