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State responds: Businesses suing Gov. Wolf arguing ‘… a fantasy-world in which there is no pandemic’

Legal arguments against the governor’s order to close all non-life sustaining business filed in a suit that includes two Warren County businesses continue.

A Harrisburg law-firm filed with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to challenge Gov. Tom Wolf’s order — a key element of the state’s response to the COVID-19 crisis — and Blueberry Hill Golf Course and Caledonia Land Company are two of the challengers.

They filed an ancillary application for relief, asking for an expedited schedule for briefing and oral argument on March 26.

“The Court’s disposition… will have profound, far-reaching consequences for millions of the Commonwealth’s citizens and for the economy of the Commonwealth, including businesses across Pennsylvania, large and small,” according to the filing made available online by the state’s Unified Judicial System.

Attorney General Josh Shapiro — and four deputies — filed a response on behalf of Wolf and Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine on March 26.

They start their argument by calling the current situation “an unprecedented public health emergency…”

“Because COVID-19 spreads mainly from person-to-person, medical experts, scientists and public health officials agree that there is only one proven method of preventing further spread of the virus: Limiting person-to-person interactions through social distancing,” they argue as the basis for the order. “The Governor had legal authority to issue the order, which is necessary to attempt to protect the lives of millions of at-risk Pennsylvanians.”

They then launch into a blistering attack of the motivations behind the challenge.

“Petitioners nonetheless seek to have the Executive Order invalidated in its entirety so that golf courses, political action committees and real estate agents can be fully operable during a pandemic,” they write. “Their petition… constructs a fantasy-world in which there is no pandemic, and their private pecuniary interests are paramount.”

They claim that the vast majority of businesses have “behaved responsibly.

“In contrast, Petitioners make reckless demands with no basis in law or reality. This Court should reject Petitioners’ effort to put their livelihoods ahead of the lives of their fellow citizens.”

The response cites the Emergency Management Services Code, Administrative Code and Disease Prevention and Control Law as the basis for the order and asserts that the Supreme Court has already upheld the order in a challenge resolved last week.

They write that the businesses arguments, especially where they point out that there are a very low number of cases in this area, “betray a misapprehension of how the virus spreads and how the Commonwealth has been affected thus far.”

“Non-life sustaining businesses in infected communities present the opportunity for unnecessary gatherings, personal contact, and interactions that will transmit the virus.

“The Entities’ argument that the global COVID-19 pandemic is somehow not a disaster emergency demonstrates an extraordinary level of myopathy about the effect this pandemic could have on the citizens of the Commonwealth and our health care system if the spread of this disease is not arrested.

“At bottom, the Entities merely disagree with the necessary actions taken by the Commonwealth. The Entities, none of whom are public health experts, believe that closing non-life-sustaining businesses is not the most efficient and practical means for preventing and suppressing COVID-19. In their view, the most efficient and practical means for the prevention and suppression of COVID-19 is to determine which Pennsylvanians have the disease and quarantine only them. This is a fiction.”

The entities responded in a Supplemental Application for Relief filed on March 26 and note that “Blueberry Hill has applied for a waiver but has not received an answer” and argued the state’s filing was a brief, not an answer and again asked the court for an expedited briefing and argument schedule.

The court granted the scheduling issue only, giving the entities until noon on March 31 to file a brief and the state until April 3 at noon to respond.

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