The City of Muskogee stepped up in a big way to fight back against COVID-19, by mailing out 100,000 masks.

That work is being done in Tulsa at Automated Mail Service. Muskogee city leaders said they believe they're the first city in Oklahoma to do this for their residents.

Workers in Tulsa are busy packing together thousands of masks. The envelopes each have five reusable cloth masks for each family in Muskogee that'll get one.

City Of Muskogee Director Of Emergency Management Tyler Evans said the city bought 100,000 masks.

"We're looking for a way to prevent and slow the spread of COVID-19 in our community, we're trying to do our best to slow the spread," Evans said.

The masks will go to all residents with city water bills. About 60,000 masks will be mailed out with the help of Automated Mail Service in Tulsa.

"They've bundled up about 7,000 that're going to be dropped off today, and another 5,000 that are going to be dropped off tomorrow that'll be mailed out," Evans said.

The other 40,000 masks will go to community groups to hand out, for those in Muskogee who don't have a water bill.

Those groups include the Muskogee County Transit Authority, Muskogee Housing Authority, and the Utilities Payment Center in Muskogee.

Evans said they're working to add other partners to the list to help with the effort. He said since the local, state and federal government recommend wearing masks, they want to make it easier, even though Muskogee does not have a mask mandate.

"So we don't want a citizen out there that doesn't have a mask, can't get a mask, we want to provide those for them to wear," Evans said.

Evans said he expects the masks to start arriving in mailboxes by Saturday.