Joe Tilden

The chairman of the Park County Commission has fallen ill with COVID-19, prompting his colleagues to self-quarantine and today’s (Tuesday’s) commission meeting to be moved online.

Commissioner Joe Tilden began feeling sick on Wednesday — the day after the commission’s regular meeting — and tested positive on Thursday.

COVID-19 can cause a wide range of symptoms, which are generally mild or moderate, but can be severe. In his case, Tilden said Thursday afternoon that he was doing OK.

“Basically I feel just like I have a bad case of the flu,” he said.

Tilden’s fellow commissioners and Park County Clerk Colleen Renner said they plan to self-quarantine for 14 days from the Tuesday, Nov. 10 meeting due to their potential exposure to the novel coronavirus.

Public health officials consider a person to have been exposed if they’ve been in direct close contact with an infected person — staying within 6 feet for 15 minutes or longer — in the two days prior to the person becoming sick. The meeting fell within that window.

“Public Health has recommended that the entire Board [of commissioners] quarantine for 14 days along with select officials who spent close contact time with the Chairman,” the commissioners’ executive assistant, Susan Kohn, wrote in a Thursday afternoon email.

The message was sent to the people who were on the Nov. 10 agenda, advising them to monitor themselves for symptoms.

Commission Vice Chairman Lee Livingston said the county wanted to get the word out quickly about the positive COVID-19 test.

“I just think we need to make sure that everybody that needs to know, knows …,” he said.

In the message, Kohn noted there’s about 6 feet of space between the commissioners’ desk and the table where presenters address the board, “which means the likelihood of someone having contracted the disease is diminished but not impossible.” As for the couple dozen people who sat in the audience during the day, “they should be safe but to continue to monitor themselves and contact their doctor if they feel they are having symptoms,” the message read.

Livingston had been on his way to Laramie when he learned of Tilden’s illness and he returned home to self-quarantine.

Commissioner Lloyd Thiel, meanwhile, canceled a planned trip to Arizona to visit his son, which was a disappointment.

“It’s not anyone’s fault, it’s part of this bull[crap] virus,” he said Monday.

Thiel said he was “more or less” following the self-quarantine recommendations from public health, though “in my opinion, it’s kind of an overreaction.”

Although it wasn’t an order to quarantine, “I will take whatever precautions I can — and I definitely don’t want to be the guy that spread it clear across the damn country, which it already is,” he said. “Hopefully we’ll get over this.”

Thiel added that, before the potential exposure at last week’s meeting, he’s been taking extra precautions, including generally wearing a mask when in public settings.

Commissioner Jake Fulkerson, meanwhile, said he was “going ‘underground’ 14 days from Tuesday morning.” Commissioner Dossie Overfield similarly said she was “going to do everything I can to self-quarantine” and stay away from other people.

“You just don’t know,” Overfield said of a possible infection. “There’s no way we know, we won’t know for a week or two, so we’ll just play it safe.”

Commissioners sit in fairly close quarters at their meetings, a few feet apart, with Thiel and Clerk Renner sitting the closest to Tilden.

Renner shut herself in her office after getting the news of the positive test in the middle of the workday. She planned to stay there until her staffers left for the day, then disinfect the office on her way out and begin to quarantine at home.

“If I keep somebody else safe …,” Renner said.

Early on in the pandemic, commissioners moved their meetings to a larger room in the basement of the courthouse so they could space out more widely, but as restrictions were eased, they moved the meetings back to their regular meeting room. Commissioners have generally not worn masks at their meetings.

“I’ve had a mask on at most places I’ve gone into,” Overfield said, “but sitting there at our desk, or sitting next to Joe [Tilden] in a work session, I wasn’t worried about it. So that was dumb.”

Going forward, “I’ll have the mask on as long as this stuff’s around,” she said, “unless we’re 6 feet apart.”

Fulkerson similarly said that he’s been wearing a mask everywhere except for commission meetings. For instance, he wore a mask while paying his property taxes at the courthouse on Thursday, before learning of Tilden’s illness.

“I guess those days [of not wearing a mask] are gone,” he said.

Commissioners were set to get a COVID-19 update from Park County Health Officer Dr. Aaron Billin and Public Health Nurse Manager Bill Crampton at today’s virtual meeting.

Livingston said that, despite the precautions being taken, “I don’t see how a lot of us are not going to get it. I just don’t see how.”