Genesee County Manager Matt Landers said he's been receiving numerous phone calls and text messages this morning after reports in the media surfaced that Genesee Community College will be designated as a COVID-19 mass vaccination site beginning March 5.
More importantly, he said that governmental leaders in the area are still working on that possibility, but nothing is official.
"It's still preliminary; we're still talking. There really isn't anything that we can release," Landers said. "We're hoping that we will be able to provide a press release -- maybe on Tuesday. At this point, we don't have any details that we can officially release."
Stories on websites of a local newspaper and a Buffalo television website indicating that GCC will become a mass vaccination clinic location came out of the Finger Lakes Region "control room" meeting with the governor's office on Friday.
WGRZ-TV reported, according to a spokesperson, that the goal of the weeklong clinic is to give 500 doses per day for the seven days, and that employees of the Genesee. Wyoming and Orleans health departments and volunteers will handle the vaccinations.
Landers said he thinks "somebody missed a step" by stating that things have been finalized.
"There's planning and there's a process, and at this time there really isn't anything newsworthy that we can release," he said, adding that state and local leaders have yet to walk through the site to work out the logistics of how the clinic will be set up.
Last week, legislators and public health directors in the three counties sent a letter to Gov. Andrew Cuomo urging him to authorize the use of the GCC campus as a regional location to administer the vaccine.
