CONWAY — The town’s mask mandate will expire beginning Feb. 28 and be replaced with an advisory as COVID-19 cases decrease in the town and region.

Having voted to lift the mandate on Feb. 14, Board of Health members cited declining case counts, lack of compliance with the mandate and individual responsibility as their motivation behind downgrading the mandate to simply an advisory.

“We feel the move is more and more toward individuals dealing with COVID and wearing a mask or not, social distancing or not,” said Board of Health member Jackie Choate, adding that “it’s time” to lift the mandate, but to still encourage residents to take their own steps in protecting themselves.

“The onus is on the individual,” Choate continued. “If you don’t wear a mask, that’s fine, I’ll wear two.”

Board of Health Chair Kathy Llamas said Conway saw a total of 56 COVID-19 cases over the course of December. That number has decreased to “maybe a total of 15” in February.

Despite the declining case count, Choate said the town, according to the state’s risk identification system, is still “under a high incidence of community transmission” because of the town’s small population.

Nearly 70% of Conway’s 1,932 residents are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, with 47% of residents receiving booster shots, according to the state Department of Public Health’s Feb. 24 data.

The move to lift the mandate also comes ahead of March 2’s joint meeting of the Frontier Regional and Union 38 school committees as they plan to discuss the face covering policy in all district schools. Choate said the “Union 38 boards of health are working in conjunction with each other” and will help advise the school committees in their decision.

The Conway Board of Health will also continue to review the mask mandate and town case numbers at its biweekly meetings.

“Along with working with the Union 38 boards of health, we will closely monitor our numbers and we are going to examine our numbers at each of our meetings,” Llamas said. “We’re all working together to make it as safe as we can.”

Chris Larabee can be reached at clarabee@recorder.com or 413-930-4081.