Local attorney & sheriff break down Mississippi’s shelter in place order

STARKVILLE, Miss. (WCBI)- We’re truly living in a time like never before dealing with the coronavirus pandemic. Rules put in place change every day it seems. With Wednesday’s shelter in place order, here we are again changing the way we live.

“Everybody’s nervous. Everybody’s scared. The number one thing is for everyone to remain calm. Be nice to your family because you’re going to be with them for awhile, be nice to your neighbors, keep your distance from everybody,” said Hosford.

The shelter in place order means just that, to stay home. Governor Tate Reeves announced the shelter in place order at a press conference Wednesday afternoon.

“You’re going to have to stay at your house unless there’s a need. Those needs will be medical emergencies, grocery stores, gasoline, those types of things that are essential to everyday living,” said Hosford.

In layman’s terms, if you can live without it, it’s something deemed as non essential. The governors executive order, prohibits any type of social gathering of more then ten people and orders non essential businesses to have their employees work from home, if possible.

“Any place where people can gather at large and likely spread the virus, those are definitely non essential,” said Hosford.

The new order will also be new to local law enforcement. But the shelter in place is something they’ll start making sure is in full force. Winston County Sheriff Jason Pugh says they’ll be enforcing the shelter in place order and start by increasing patrols.

“We’ve got a very strong what we call an auxiliary force, a reserve force, we’ve got some very strong volunteers who are prior officers. We’re reaching out to all those guys so we can start pulling things together. Basically, there’s no playbook we have on this. We’re not doing something we’ve done in the past. I’ve quite honestly, not seen anything like this in my lifetime and don’t know anybody who has. We’re kind of writing the book now. We’re making our game as we go. In all honestly we’re trying to think two steps ahead right now,” said Sheriff Pugh.

The shelter in place starts Friday evening at 5 p.m. and will remain until April 20th.