(Seguin) — Guadalupe County officials are responding to reports that have been critical of a vacation taken recently by the person in charge of the county’s COVID-19 response.
Guadalupe County Emergency Management Coordinator Patrick Pinder took a vacation at the end of November, which stretched into early December. Pinder, his wife and some friends traveled to the Dominican Republic for what was largely a fishing trip. Pinder has received some criticism for traveling during the pandemic. The CDC currently recommends that people not travel to the Dominican Republic. It has a level four risk assessment, which suggests the risk for exposure to COVID-19 is very high in that nation.
Guadalupe County Judge Kyle Kutscher says he had spoken to Pinder about his travel plans. He says he raised what concerns he had, but in the end, Pinder decided that he would safely be able to take his planned trip.
“I knew that Patrick was going to take vacation early on, months and months ago. We didn’t find out really the specific location until I say a couple of weeks prior to and that’s when Mr. Pinder and I had a discussion about whether — I asked Patrick, do you think it’s safe to travel? And, we talked about concerns and the issues, rising cases and personally, I had a little bit more concern about the travel rather than the destination just because of airports and the nature of people being more congested and together. So, we had those conversations and Patrick being the person that has been very involved in COVID knowing precautions to take, basically just thought that he could take those precautions and safety measures because he is so familiar with them to be safe and so he and wife decided to still go on the trip,” said Kutscher.
Guadalupe County does not have its own health department, which made Pinder the chief spokesperson and resource for all things related to the local COVID-19 response. Judge Kutscher says he knows that Pinder never would have taken that trip if he didn’t believe that he could stay safe. He says he took extra precautions during his travel, and he made sure he did all he could to reduce his exposure.
Kutscher says Pinder is not a COVID-19 denier, and this trip doesn’t necessarily make him a hypocrite for traveling at this time.
“Mr. Pinder has never been one throughout this entire pandemic to downplay the seriousness of COVID. He’s been very consistent in a steady voice of bringing awareness to the public and only providing information and being a resource to not only myself as county judge but commissioners court and the public. So, I think he thought about it very long and hard and was very serious in his approach to say ‘okay, how would people look at this? How dangerous is it? Where are we at as a county? What message are we sending? Personally, I think he looked at it from a standpoint — did he think he and his wife could be safe traveling and ultimately, he came to the decision that he thought he could? said Kutscher.
Judge Kutscher says regardless of whether you believe Pinder should have traveled or not, he wants to make sure that he doesn’t get lumped into a discussion about some other public officials who have said one thing and then have done something else when it comes to COVID-19. The mayors of Austin, Texas and Denver, Colorado have both come under fire recently for telling their constituents not to travel, while they were traveling themselves. Kutscher says he thinks it’s a bit unfair to include Pinder in that conversation.
“There was some misrepresentation in another article in a neighboring community comparing him to the Austin mayor. We don’t have those same type of restrictions in this community. Mr. Pinder and the county have not been restricting travel. We’ve been making recommendations all along about practicing social distancing and everything and all the messages with the governor and state of Texas and CDC have been putting out but we have not been as strong handed sort of speak as some of the larger, more metropolitan areas so I understand why some people may see this and feel frustration but at the same time, I ask everybody not to put Mr. Pinder or the county in the same position as Austin, Houston, Dallas, New York, some of those places saying that we restricted everybody from doing everything yet he is still traveling,” said Pinder.
Pinder is also discussing his decision to take the trip. He’s been on the frontlines since the pandemic started, and says he gave this trip careful consideration. He says this was a trip that they had booked long before the pandemic hit, and says they monitored the situation right up until it was time for them to leave for the Dominican Republic.
“During the COVID pandemic, we were monitoring the situation down there in the Dominican Republic and we kind of stayed on top of their COVID numbers, their travel restrictions, things like that. So for most of the summer, that country was not allowing anybody to come in and everything was still shut down similar to the way we did here in the states. As the summer and the end of the summer progressed, we continued to monitor the numbers and things like that down there and just like we do here everyday. My daily job is to make sure that we are tracking the data for COVID here in Guadalupe County so as we got closer to the date, we got some information back from the travel agency, the airlines, the country basically that everything was opening up and that the COVID numbers down there were lower so my wife and I made the decision to continue our trip,” said Pinder.
Pinder says they took all the necessary precautions that come whenever you travel. He says they took extra steps as well, once they arrived in the Dominican Republic.
“We followed all the standards, CDC protocols that we do here. We wore our masks on the airplane because that is a requirement to travel. You have to wear a mask in the airport. You have to wear a mask on the plane while you are traveling. It has to be over your nose and your mouth so we followed those guidelines. We had hand sanitizer. We took extra masks. We had temperature checks. Before we left, we checked our temperature and made sure we were good. When we got to the Dominican Republic, before we even got out of the terminal, we were selected for a COVID test. So my wife, I and our friends that we were with all got tested for COVID. It was a rapid test. It was like a 10 minute test, we all came back negative,”said Pinder.
Pinder says they felt very comfortable going to the resort, because its capacity had been reduced in an effort to try to allow guests to practice social distancing.
“It was a more isolated area, less people. So, we made that decision before we left. We were like we are going to be on a resort. There’s not going to be that many people. The resort was only at 50 percent capacity. So, there was availability space. We could do what we want and not see anybody. So, we made that decision and we did travel down there,” said Pinder.
Judge Kutscher says he’s well aware of the optics of this story, but he wanted to try to provide some nuance to the discussion. He says it’s still very important for people to take this pandemic seriously. Nothing about Pinder’s travel should change that perspective.
“One thing that we know for certain as a community is that this is an ever-changing situation. When this all started there were a lot of uncertainties and unknowns. Everybody was very careful. A lot of measures were taken. Some restrictions put into place. It got better. Then, it got worse over summer. After September, things got better. Now, we are still seeing a rise again. I think we are all trying to find a balance between still living our lives while being safe and that involves all of us paying attention, taking into consideration what dangers are out there and trying to make good personal decisions. I think looking back, on the trip and some of those other things might have done a few things differently but ultimately, like I said, Mr. Pinder being somebody that is very informed felt like he could exercise and take those precautionary measures in that situation and still be safe and I think that’s why he ultimately made the decision to travel, “said Kutscher.
Pinder says he hopes that people will take away from this story that you need to have some personal responsibility whether you are traveling great distances, or down the street to the grocery store. He says there’s a certain amount of risk every time you leave the home during the pandemic, and people still need to make sure that they are taking care of themselves as best they can.
“You are going to have to travel whether that’s to a vacation out of state, from outside of Guadalupe County to work in Bexar County or Austin or Houston or Dallas any of these hotspots. So their threat level is the same as the United States so the CDC is recommendation doesn’t say we can’t travel to those countries. There are some restrictive countries we can not travel to but it’s just like me going to the Dominican is kind of like me driving to San Antonio. San Antonio is a COVID hotspot I guess you could say,” said Pinder.
Taking care of yourself, which in turn helps to take care of others, is key to the response of this pandemic. Pinder says they assessed the risks associated with the trip, and hopes others will do the same anytime they have to venture away from home during the pandemic.
“You have to be accountable for what you are going to do if you leave your house to go to the grocery store. Do you want to take that precaution and listen to the governor’s recommendations and local jurisdictions and wear your mask. I mean you can go to any restaurant in Guadalupe County and you’ll see people that wear their mask, have hand sanitizer, wash their hands — they are taking their own precautions to protect themselves and their families and that’s really what you have to take away from this is here in Guadalupe County, we are not making those decisions like other jurisdictions to close down all these things at this point. So, we are still following the governor’s guidelines so it’s just self-accountability,” said Pinder.
Pinder never guessed he would have to defend his vacation plans. He says despite the extra attention, he remains committed to doing his job. This week, he released the latest COVID-19 data for Guadalupe County. GRMC is reporting 18 COVID-19 related hospitalizations this week, with a seven-day moving average of 18 COVID patients. Guadalupe County is reporting 47 deaths since the pandemic started, but that number is expected to be much higher. The Texas Department of State Health Services webpage is currently reporting 87 deaths in Guadalupe County. A lag in reporting is part of the reason for the discrepancy between those two numbers. There are currently 205 confirmed cases, 75 probably-active cases and more than 5,300 total cases since the start of the pandemic. More than 4,300 have already recovered from the virus.
Officials say you are still encouraged to wear a mask when you go out, practice social distancing whenever you can, and wash your hands frequently.