COVID-19 Impacts Local Communities

By ANTHONY GADALETA

ELMWOOD PARK – Empty streets, lines of impatient shoppers at a local grocery store, masked people along Mayhill Street are signs of what the world has come to in the face of a global pandemic.

Town residents like Illiana Natale have been heeding the guidance of state and officials and health experts to help flatten the spread of the deadly COVID-19 virus, which has no cure yet: Keep practicing social distancing and stay home.

“I have been doing what experts have been advising: staying home and keeping my distance. I would suggest the same: to limit outings, keep your distance from others, and to definitely stay home,” Natale said, who temporarily lost her hours at the local bakery. “Although we are sacrificing by not seeing loved ones or enjoying the spring weather, essential workers are putting themselves on the line and working overtime to help in every way possible, so the least we can do is follow their directions.”

With continuing coverage and rapidly evolving news development on the COVID-19 pandemic, world leaders, scientists, and healthcare workers across the globe scramble to ensure they are flattening the curve, developing a vaccine, and utilizing ventilators and other essential medicinal products to care for infected patients and keep residents safe.

But at the local level, the pain of a quarantined community is real. Towns like Elmwood Park are closing non-essential business except for grocery, liquor, and hardware stores as well as small local businesses such as diners and pizzerias. 

Elmwood Park, with a population of 20,120 residents, has been hit by the crisis like many others with businesses closed and small businesses offering alternative options to make their money during these uncertain times. Municipal operations have been suspended until further notice and are offering virtual meetings online to communicate with the town on the most up-to-date developments.

According to NJ.com, the town of Elmwood Park has approximately 460 known cases to date, with more tests being conducted as the state of New Jersey and neighboring New York reached their apex period of cases this past week.

“The Elmwood Park community has been hit very hard with the COVID-19 virus with over 300 confirmed positive cases to date. Our Chief of Police/Borough Administrator, as well as other emergency response personnel are engaged in community outreach to keep residents home, and assist them as needed. We have a first class group of first responders, in proud to say they have worked with the utmost professionalism and persistence.” said Francesco Fasolo, Councilman of Elmwood Park.

COPING WITH THE VIRUS

As the virus makes its way around the world, consistent restrictions have been put into place gradually to allow the new initiative of social distancing to be enacted that has slowly affected the nation’s economy to a near standstill as schools and universities, offices, malls, movie theaters, restaurants, small businesses, and countless others to close their doors to operate remotely.

Select food establishments offer curbside pickup, takeout, or delivery rather than the traditional dine-in to avoid large gatherings. People have been asked to stay home and off the streets for the majority of the day and to only go out for an “essential” purpose such as going to the supermarket for groceries or their pharmacy to pick up their prescriptions.

Essential stores that remain open during the crisis are supermarkets, pharmacies, hardware, liquor stores, and others to allow people to stock up on essentials and have what they need to survive the pandemic. Due to a hoarding issue, many retailers have limited particular products such as toilet paper, hand sanitizer, soap, meat, chicken, eggs, milk, and water to a purchase of one to keep their stores stocked and to ensure a fair buying practice.

Leadership has never been more crucial during this time as the federal government has not unified us a nation by any means and leaving it up to statewide governors around the country to decide on their terms how to proceed.

“This situation is once in a generation. We are combatting a global pandemic that is a test to our strength and unity as citizens, not only of the United States but of the world,” said Fasolo. “My opinion is that we need stable and scientific based leadership. Unfortunately, we have not seen enough of that from Washington. As New Jerseyans, we are grateful to have such stability from our Governor Phil Murphy, as well as great leadership from other surrounding states, particularly Governor Cuomo, of New York.”

According to Governor Murphy, he signed another executive order to further mitigate the spread of COVID-19 by placing tighter restriction on essential businesses on the amount of customers entering a place to stricter practices of social distancing in an effort to prevent and slow the spread.

“Only go out if you absolutely have to”, said Murphy.

We’ve lost 233 New Jerseyans since yesterday.

We’ve now lost 1,932 New Jerseyans to #COVID19.

Behind these stark and impersonal numbers are real people and real families.

We must remember them. pic.twitter.com/2xu83hyODB

— Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) April 10, 2020

“Luckily, Elmwood Park has a strong group of essential personnel that has kept our day to day functions in check, even as our Borough Hall has been closed off to the public. There are a few ways we have kept the public ‘in the loop’ so to say. Firstly, we have set up drop boxes for tax payments and other municipal business for the residents to continue. We have also made our monthly Mayor and Council meetings accessible via teleconference, and are discussing moving toward video conferencing if the pandemic continues, Fasolo said.

While it’s been more than five weeks combatting the virus in quarantine, many residents understand the need for social distancing.

“To prevent the spread of the virus, we must abide by what is advised if we want to return back to normal at any point in time”, said Natale.

LOCAL COMMUNITY HIT BY COVID-19

Maria’s Bakery in Saddle Brook is an authentic Italian Bakery owned by the Scaduto family who wanted to bring a taste of their Sicilian roots to Bergen County. The bakery serves up classic favorites such as cannolis, cookies, cupcakes, custom cakes, and more. Being another small business themselves, they have been forced to temporarily cut workers only limiting to a fewer amount of employees as business has gone down since the start of the pandemic. Their dine-in seating area has been removed and they only allow 10 people to enter at a time to prevent an over amount of customers gathering. At this time, they are operating limited hours.

“Maria’s Bakery, like any other local business, has been significantly impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. Easter is one of the busiest holidays of the year for the bakery, and it is not as busy as past years due to the conditions we are undergoing. Although we are still open, business hours have shifted and shortened, as the days are shorter and we are not there 7 days a week as per usual,” said Natale, who works at Maria’s Bakery.

“Not as many customers are permitted in the store due to social distancing, but for the most part, it is business as usual. As conditions change, we continue to adapt to the circumstances”, said Natale.

With fear and anxiety ramped, many are questioning when the outbreak will be over and when the town can return to a sense of normality and prevent a second potential outbreak in the fall when flu season returns.

As of now, for the state of New Jersey and other states around us, social distancing has been placed until April 30 with May and June being recovery periods.

Quoting Murphy, residents believe: “We are all in this together, we will get through this.”

Despite the alarming circumstances, the Garden State has always been resilient and will get through this. Communities from across New Jersey have come together through the efforts of healthcare workers on the front lines to volunteers helping those in need of food and essential goods for food pantries and donations, to those small businesses that are still operating paycheck to paycheck to keep themselves afloat by offering customers curbside pickup, contactless delivery, and pickup.

The state recently held a Jersey 4 Jersey benefit concert on television networks such as CBS and NBC where local New Jersey icons like Jon Bon-Jovi, Bruce Springsteen, Charlie Puth, Tony Bennett, and more who put the power of music in their spotlight to combat the pandemic.

In times of stress, anxiety, and doubt, the community of Elmwood Park, Maria’s Bakery, and Governor Murphy, like many others, are hopeful that we will get through this and reach a point where no future cases are reported, widespread testing is conducted to trace symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals to put an end to the spread of COVID-19. Though social distancing guidelines are likely to be in place this summer, light is still at the end of the tunnel. THIS TOO SHALL PASS!

There is no doubt that New Jersey will come back stronger, safer, and together as one community to successfully end the pandemic.