A coalition of Florida mayors are trying to convince the governor that coronavirus mitigation measures are desperately needed again.

What You Need To Know

Gov. Ron DeSantis lifted restrictions in September.

Now, with cases spiking and the situation expected to get worse over the holidays, the mayors say the governor needs to reverse course.

"Having a mandatory mask mandate throughout the state so there's consistency, allowing us as individual counties and cities to determine what other restrictions make sense,” St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman said during a Wednesday Zoom call. “Whether it's a 25% occupancy limitation, a 50%, whatever the number is that works for our communities and allowing us to enforce that." 

In St. Pete, the Tropicana Field testing site closed early on Wednesday for the second day in a row.

Mayors from five Florida cities were on the call and hope the governor responds to their message for help.

Kriseman said he wants to see more state testing, contact tracing and more mitigation to combat the surge in COVID-19.

The governor in late September moved Florida into Stage 3, which lifted all statewide coronavirus-related restrictions on businesses and also removed enforcement of local cities mask mandates.   

"Since the governor opened up the economy totally in late September and simultaneously prevented local governments from enforcing individual mask mandates, we have seen an enormous surge,” said Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber.

“The governor didn't just open things up, he flung the door open and said there's no rules anymore,” he said.

Mayors on the call said they believe DeSantis is following the herd immunity track. Kriseman says that track will cause the deaths of 50,000 Floridains.

“It makes our jobs as mayors so much harder when the person who is at the top of the state, the leader for the state of Florida isn't on the same page as us,” Kriseman said. 

The mayors on the Zoom call are bi-partisan — both Democrat and Republican.

Spectrum News reached out to the governor’s office about the coalition of mayors but did not receive a response by our deadline.