Draft regulations are coming down that are expected to add more teeth to the enforcement of social distancing directives. Yesterday the governor not only extended the public health emergency for another month, but also exercised her authority to fast track the implementation of new rules that will impose hundreds, if not thousands of dollars in fines for violators.

In her latest order, the governor noted that since her stay-at-home directive, the police have had to respond to more than 3,300 violations of social gathering and social distancing. Public Health spokesperson Janela Carrera acknowledges they've received plenty of complaints.

"For the past several months, we've really just been kind of going at little by little - just sort of encouraging people to follow the executive order," she described of the operating environment.

Apparently, the agency will go from merely encouraging compliance, to more serious enforcement. It will soon release draft rules and regulations that will allow it to come down much harder on violators of Public Health directives, as she said, "It does include a proposal to levy fines for those who are not in compliance with the executive order. And so in the draft rules and regs, it has a scaled version of fines."

The fines will range from $100 up to a $1,000 for individuals and from $1000 to $10,000 for businesses. Meanwhile, to fast-track the process, the governor invoked the emergency health powers act and "suspended rule-making procedures," - in short, it allows Public Health to shortcut the typical process for new rule-making under the Administrative Adjudication Act.

"If we go the normal route of the 'AAA' process, by the time we get that done that could really take awhile," Carrera admitted.

But republicans, including Senator Jim Moylan, have seized on the AAA suspension. The GOP in a news release comparing it to a dictatorship, and Moylan introducing a new bill to impose more checks and balances under the Health Powers Act.

Meanwhile, Carrera says they do plan to hold a public hearing on the still unreleased rules. And Adelup press secretary Krystal Paco-San Agustin says that hearing could come as early as this weekend.