The COVID Project
The record
- Jurisdiction
- Tennessee
- Level
- State
- Authority
- Tenn. Code Ann. sec. 8-6-109; construing 2021 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 550 and Tenn. Code Ann. secs. 68-2-601, 68-2-603, 68-2-609
- Issued
- 2021-05-26 May 26, 2021
- Effective
- 2021 (opinion) (read as 2021-05-26)
- End
- n/a (opinion) (read as 2021-09-30)
- In force
- May 26, 2021 to Sept. 30, 2021
- Quarters
- 2021 Q22021 Q3
2020 Q22020 Q32020 Q42021 Q12021 Q22021 Q3
- Limitation types
- Business closureQuarantine and isolationStanding duty
- Addressees
- county health officers and directors; persons and public establishments within the county
- Character
- agency interpretation
- Collection
- Standing duties: Tennessee DUT-TN
Operative words
Public Chapter 550 gives the county health officer - not the county mayor - authority to issue county-wide health mandates necessary to protect the general health and safety of the citizens of the county.... Tenn. Code Ann. § 68-2-609 now provides: The county health officer is empowered to order: (1) The quarantine of any place or person, if the county health officer finds that quarantine is necessary to protect the public health from an epidemic; (2) The closure of any public establishment, facility or building if the county health officer finds unsanitary conditions of such a nature and extent to significantly threaten the public health
Penalty
Enforcement by the county health director (sec. 68-2-603(b), Ex. DUT-TN-004)
What it required
Confirmed that after Public Chapter 550 (Ex. TN-065) the county health officer held the authority to issue county-wide health mandates by rule, that sec. 68-2-609 empowers the officer to order quarantine and closure of public establishments, that the county health director retained the power to enforce those rules, and that the validity of any particular mandate depends on its terms and on State law including the Commissioner's rules. Character as recorded: agency_interpretation (Attorney General opinion).
Retrieval noteOfficial PDF from the Attorney General's site (657,814 bytes). The opinion also records that Pub. Ch. 550 made county boards of health advisory and that a county health officer's mandates 'can even be foreclosed' by State law; the text layer is doubled-character and was read after de-duplication.