The COVID-19 face mask issue continues to cause divisions within Manhattan Beach, from disagreements within City Council, to a bloody street confrontation.

The Manhattan Beach City Council is still working on how it might amend its mask order that calls for fines up to $350 for those not wearing a mask. 

And a violent street confrontation over mask-wearing in Manhattan Beach (which subsequently became a viral video) exposed just how high emotions are running about the question of where and when to wear a face covering. 

As soon as the Manhattan Beach City Council enacted an emergency order calling for fines for those who are not wearing masks, the order came under fire for being overly broad.

The council formed a subcommittee with Mayor Pro Tem Suzanne Hadley and Councilmember Hildy Stern to examine possible clarifications to the ordinance.

But at Tuesday night's council meeting, Hadley complained that although she entered the subcommittee to modify the ordinance, she was told that she didn't have the votes on council to make changes other than clarifying that citations would not be enforced on people in cars, children under 18, or people in their front and back yards. 

"I was unsuccessful in getting modifications for walking with a spouse, walking in one’s own neighborhood outside of commercial district, riding a bike, or playing tennis," she said, noting that she knows that the face covering rule as it applies to tennis is part of a county health order.

Hadley added that she was frustrated with all of the staff time spent on the subcommittee. "Why should we tie up staff time when the other side has no interest in modifying this order?" she asked.

But council member Nancy Hersman said that the focus should be on getting people to wear masks and bringing the COVID-19 infection numbers down.

"This isn’t a time to back down. Watch the news. Watch what's going on around the world," she said. "Just wear a mask. And move on. Really - I agree with you - we should‘t be spending staff time on this. Let's see how we can get our numbers down. Chipping away at it is not helping us. We need to all be on same page on this."

City Manage Bruce Moe said that the staff's goal was not to issue citations, but to get people to wear masks. "We've issued seven times as many warnings as citations," he said, noting that most of the people who received warnings had masks with them but were not wearing them, or were not wearing them properly. He also added that the city had received "a lot of positive feedback" from local businesses.

Nevertheless, council agreed to investigate Hermosa Beach's mask ordinance - which names specific high traffic areas where the order will be enforced - to consider how some of that city's location-specific wording could be used to clarify the Manhattan Beach order.

The Hermosa Beach order calls for citations to be issued to individuals who are not wearing a mask at any time when in downtown Hermosa Beach, all city parks, the Strand, the Greenbelt and the beach when out of the water; and when not maintaining physical distance in any other public location in Hermosa Beach.

Meanwhile, in downtown Manhattan Beach, a conflict over mask-wearing got violent last week, and the video of the incident went viral, after appearing on the gossip website TMZ.

In the July 31 video, two men are sitting outside on Manhattan Ave., about to eat burritos, when a couple walks by and admonishes them for not wearing masks. When one of the men says he doesn't believe in wearing masks, an argument ensues and the woman throws her coffee at him. The non-mask-wearing man then jumps up and swings at the woman's companion, punching him in the face and causing him to bleed from the mouth.

The two non-mask-wearing men, identified as locals Matthew Roy and James Hernandez, told Fox11 News that they didn't believe in wearing masks, but they had kept their backs turned to the couple and were not looking for a conflict. Hernandez said that he wore a body camera because he was wearing a "MAGA 2020" hat and he had had "a lot of confrontations" about it.

No arrests were made in the case. Additionally, a further debate has evolved about whether the video was staged or not. Nevertheless, the video stirred up what had already been an acrimonious debate about mask wearing and enforcement around town. 

To read more on mask-wearing in Manhattan Beach, read how police have asked residents to help them by complying with the mask order; and how you can support local businesses by buying masks from Manhattan Beach merchants.