Why an Arizona County Turned Down $1.9 Million in COVID Relief
lenellmorgan3434
Feb 14, 2022
1 min read
Jack Healy
The town of Bisbee in Cochise County, Ariz., Feb. 4, 2022. (Paul Ratje/The New York Times)
The $1.9 million in pandemic aid would have gone a long way in Cochise County, a rural borderland where a winter of infections swamped hospitals. There was money for tracking cases. Testing in remote ranching towns. Funds fortifying the Arizona county’s strained health department.
But the county’s Republican-controlled board of supervisors stunned many residents and health care workers by voting last month to reject the federal money, becoming one of the rare places in America to turn down COVID-19 assistance from Washington.
“We’re done,” said Peggy Judd, one of two Republican supervisors who voted against accepting the money. “We’re treating it like the common cold.”
The vote transformed what would usually be a rote line on a government agenda into an emotional flashpoint in this county of 125,000 people where life is shaped by the southwestern border, rhythms of ranching and, now, a pandemic that has killed 522 residents.
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