4 search results for "Stephen Daniels"

Activism, Anti-vaccine, Conspiracy theories, Coronavirus pandemic, Crazy Republicans, Cringeworthy, Dangerous Republicans, Embarrassing Republicans, Extremism, Immigration, Intolerance, Janet Rowland, LGBT issues, Propaganda, Public health, Republican incompetence, Vile Republicans

Newly-appointed Board of Public Health member is anti-vax, anti immigrant, anti-gay extremist

by Anne Landman • July 7, 2023 • 32 Comments

Stephen Daniels, an extremist and anti-vaxxer the Commissioners just appointed to be Chair of the Mesa County Board of Public Health (Source: Facebook)

A person the Mesa County Commissioners appointed to the Board of Health yesterday, Stephen D. Daniels, is a strong supporter of anti-vax conspiracy theorist and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (RFK), according to his social media accounts. Posts on the same sources also reveal Daniels is anti-immigrant, anti-gay, anti-Disney, and a climate change denier who opposes Colorado’s new family and medical leave law, which gives workers paid time off to care for a new baby or a loved one who has a serious health condition.

Presidential candidate RFK, whom Daniels supports, opposes vaccines that prevent dire illnesses in children and adults, like polio, measles and smallpox. In 2017, Scientific American wrote that “For more than a decade, Kennedy has promoted anti-vaccine propaganda completely unconnected to reality,” and if his anti-vax advocacy “leads to even a small decline in vaccine rates across the country, it will result in the waste of untold amounts of money and in all likelihood, the preventable deaths of infants too young to be vaccinated.”

Board of Public Health & county commissioners violated state public health law with their new intergovernmental agreement

by Anne Landman • November 25, 2023 • 10 Comments

Stephen D. Daniels, new Chair of the Mesa County Board of Public Health, violated Colorado Title 25 by giving control over the health department’s budget to the elected county commissioners. No provision in the state public health law permits that.

When the Mesa County Commissioners had the Board of Health (BOH) sign their new Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA), the commissioners, County Attorney Todd Starr and all 7 members of the new BOH all either knowingly or unknowingly violated Colorado Revised Statute Title 25, Article 1, Part 5(k).

Title 25 of the Colorado Code (pdf), the Public Health Act of 2008, restructured public health throughout the state and spells out all of the rights, responsibilities and duties of county Boards of Health and health departments.

Article 1, Part 5(k) of the Act, titled “County or District Boards of Public Health,” (pdf) gives Boards of Health, and only Boards of Health, the right to accept, control and administer all state and federal money, as well as any other property and services health departments get. That includes unrestricted funds health departments get from any source. Only Boards of Health can enter into agreements regarding such money or assistance, and only Boards of Health can decide how to use these funds to advance public health in the county.

Title 25 contains no provision that gives elected county commissioners the right to any control over a health department’s budget, funding or grants, yet that’s what Commissioners Janet Rowland, Cody Davis and Bobbie Daniel have done with their new IGA, which handed the commissioners control over the health department’s budget, and which even controls what BOH members are allowed to discuss at their own meetings.

Section 5(k) of Article I of Title 25 says,

“5. In addition to all other powers and duties conferred and imposed upon a county board of health… a county board of health…shall have and exercise the following specific powers and duties:

Colorado Code 25-1-508 (2022), Section 5 (k), gives sole power to the Board of Health to receive, use, disburse all moneys allotted to the public health department for public health functions, and to enter into agreements to receive such funds. The law does not give any of this power to county commissioners. Commissioners have illicitly seized this power.

Commissioner Janet Rowland, in her 2020 campaign video titled “Transparency” in which Rowland says, “I believe transparency in government is absolutely critical…I believe that you, the taxpayer, should know what your government is up to…” She and the other county commissioners just coerced the new Board of Health into signing a new intergovernmental agreement that violates Title 25, Article 1, Section 5(k) of the state public health law.

That’s a powerful statute and the Board of Health is either unaware of it, or intentionally chose to violate it.

Either all three Mesa County Commissioners, the county attorney and all seven Board of Health members are unaware of this provision in the state public health law, or they all intentionally violated it.

County residents deserve county commissioners and a Board of Heath that at the very least will abide by the law.

So far, that’s not what we’ve gotten.

Anti-vaccine, Conspiracy theories, Extremism, Health, Janet Rowland, Local concerns, politics, Public health, Stephen D. Daniels

KREX TV explores how the County seized control over all of Mesa County Public Health Department’s contracts when it only contributes 4.2% of the agency’s budget

by Anne Landman • November 20, 2023 • 8 Comments

KREX reporter Michael Loggerwell’s story about Mesa County’s new Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) with the Health Department- Part 1

KREX-TV News recently did a two-part series about the Mesa County Commissioners’ new, post-Jeff Kuhr Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) that more tightly regulates the County’s relationship with the Public Health Department (MCPHD), and how it differs from the old 2012 agreement in important ways that could negatively affect public health and safety in the county.

Mesa County Commissioners’ new chair of the Public Health Board refuses to say if he believes Covid-19 was “targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people” and spare Jews and Chinese people

by Anne Landman • July 19, 2023 • 11 Comments

On of the many Facebook and Instagram posts by Mesa County Board of Public Health chair Stephen D. Daniels, lauding Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a vocal anti-vaxxer who has spread lies and conspiracy theories for “the better part of two decades.”

The Mesa County Commissioners’ newly-appointed Chair of the Public Health Board, Stephen D. Daniels, has made it known that he is a strong supporter of anti-vax conspiracy theorist and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (RFK). In multiple posts on his social media accounts, Daniels urges people to be open to discussion about Kennedy’s views and believe what Kennedy has to say.

But does Daniels support what RFK told a table full of people last week at a press event in Manhattan (video), that the Covid-19 virus is “ethnically targeted” to attack Caucasians and Black people, and to spare Jews and Chinese people?

RFK’s comments were widely reported as being a “Bigoted new Covid conspiracy about Jews and Chinese” (NY Times), as being “deplorable” and “hurtful” (Fox News), as spreading “false claims” about Covid-19 (CBS News) and being “antisemitic and racist” (ABC News).

Specifically, RFK said in part,

“There is an argument that it [Covid-19] is ethnically targeted. COVID-19 attacks certain races disproportionately. COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.”