Rockland Coronavirus: Ramapo Town Supervisor Tests Positive

RAMAPO, NY — The supervisor of the town with the most coronavirus cases in Rockland County has tested positive for the virus, News 12 reported. Michael Specht has been the town's top official since 2017; before that he was deputy town attorney.

Specht has been sparring with Rockland County Executive Ed Day about the outbreak. Most of the county's confirmed cases are in Ramapo, clustered in Monsey and Spring Valley.

As complaints pour in on social media, Rockland County officials have said that members of the large ultra-Orthodox community in Ramapo are not following the state PAUSE program which forbids all gatherings — including at houses of worship, closed private and public schools, and businesses.

Day on Thursday called on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to create a containment zone in Rockland similar to the one created last month in New Rochelle.

The New Rochelle zone was a 1-mile radius around a synagogue that was the nation's first hot spot the virus.

Complaints that members of the local Hasidic community are not practicing social distancing rules reached a flashpoint this week over the funeral of Josef Neumann, 72, who succumbed to his injuries three months after a man wielding a machete attacked people attending a Hanukkah celebration in Monsey.

Day said that local police are not allowed to enforce the social distancing guidelines set in place by the state. He has called on the governor's office to either give local governments that ability or have state police enforce them.

BREAKING - Ramapo Town Supervisor Michael Specht says he’s been diagnosed with the coronavirus.@News12HV
— Tara Rosenblum (@tararosenblum) April" class="redactor-linkify-object">https://twitter.com/tararosenb... 3, 2020

Rockland county health and planning investigators had confirmed 1,661 of the 3,751 Rockland cases reported by the state Health Department as of Thursday afternoon.