There was a hint of normalcy in the air this past holiday weekend. With many California counties making the transition into Stage 2(b) of the state’s Resiliency Roadmap in response to the coronavirus pandemic, people took advantage of open beaches, restaurants and retail stores.
But many businesses remain closed, even with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recent ad hoc announcements that:
» Retail stores may fully reopen if permitted by their counties
» Hair salons and barbershops may reopen in counties in Stage 2(b) (instead of Stage 3)
» Guidelines to reopen fitness facilities (previously scheduled for Stage 3) may be released in a week or so
But bars and wineries, along with large segments of the tourist industry, cannot open until we make the transition into Stage 3. Moreover, businesses, schools, and parks and recreation departments that provide summer camps and activities for children remain in limbo, trying to navigate inconsistencies in both the Roadmap and county public health orders.
As a result, under current policy, the economic and social damage caused by closures across critical sectors of our economy will continue until Newsom changes his mind, or alters his Roadmap and effectively moves an industry into Stage 2 (as he did repeatedly this week).
Or he might determine that the entire state is ready to make the transition into Stage 3.
Or he might do something else.
We have no way of knowing what Newsom will do, when he will do it, or why.
As comforting as it is to see many businesses reopening, adhering to this “approach” of reopening one industry at a time without rhyme or reason would be yet another mistake in our handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since issuing the stay-at-home order on March 19, the state’s response to the pandemic has been a chronic planning failure. There was no plan for making the transition out of the stay-at-home order when it was issued. Nor was there a plan when it became obvious in early April that the order had succeeded.
When Newsom finally revealed his plan for loosening the stay-at-home order in early May, it did not include the final criteria that counties would be required to meet if they wanted to reopen even faster. When those criteria were unveiled several days later, it was clear that they had been developed unilaterally by the state and were designed to ensure that most counties could not meet them.
It took a round of defiance, protests and intense lobbying by county officials and state legislators to generate reasonable criteria that many counties could actually meet.
With actual and threatened litigation by industries, churches and the federal Justice Department, the Resiliency Roadmap was amended three times this week — the stages are being redefined on the fly.
Yet, with the chaos continuing to come out of Sacramento and so many people and businesses still in limbo, the question remains: What’s the actual plan for making the transition into and through Stage 3?
Your guess is as good as mine. Newsom has not identified any criteria that will guide his decision, nor specified a timeline. Sound familiar?
Having seen this movie before, we do not need to see it again. Many counties will likely transition through Stage 2(b) with virtually no change in COVID-19 case or hospitalization data (just as they did Stage 1).
It will take roughly 14-21 days for counties in Stage 2(b) to assess the impact of their reopening measures on the trajectory of the virus. Why not use this time to work collaboratively with the state to develop and publish an orderly and transparent process and sensible criteria for transitioning into and through Stage 3?
Unlike the pattern over the past 10 weeks, this process would actually fulfill Newsom’s pledges to collaborate with counties and give strong weight to their views. It would also enable people and businesses to plan for the summer and fall, improving our chances for a stronger economic recovery.
Ideally, the counties that collaborated to devise sensible criteria for transitioning into Stage 2(b) would do the same thing to guide the transition through Stage 3, sending their proposals to the state with the goal of reaching an agreement in the next two weeks. By the time the hospitalization data would be available to assess the success of Stage 2(b), we would have the necessary policies and criteria in place to enable counties to transition into Phase 3 if the data indicate they could responsibly do so.
Newsom and the state Department of Public Health made the transition from Stage 1 to 2 of our pandemic response unnecessarily slow and difficult. The transition through Stage 2 and into Stage 3 is showing signs of following a similar pattern.
Let’s learn from our mistakes, not repeat them.
Our counties and state need to start collaborating on a sensible, transparent and predictable process that will enable counties to make the transition into Stage 3 if they have successfully transitioned through Stage 2(b).
This time, let’s do the right thing before exploring every other option.
— Brian Goebel served as a senior official in the Treasury and Homeland Security departments following 9/11. Since 2005, he has founded successful consulting and analytics firms serving governments around the globe; launched 2040 Matters, a nonpartisan public policy blog dedicated to restoring the American Dream for younger Americans; and was elected to the Montecito Water District Board of Directors in 2018. Click here for previous columns. The opinions expressed are his own.