Monday marks a big day for San Diego County businesses as owners anticipate the return to indoor operations – under some modifications, of course.
Restaurants, places of worship, museums, movie theaters, hair and nail salons, barbershops, gyms and fitness centers will be able to offer services indoors once more with capacity restrictions. The move was announced Friday as the state rolled out a new tiered system to measure the number of coronavirus cases in counties and what that figure means in terms of reopening.
Reopening San Diego
San Diego County is looking ahead to the partial reopening of many businesses.
San Diego County was placed in the red tier, which means there is “substantial risk” of spreading the virus. According to the state, this tier means “some non-essential indoor business operations are closed.”
Under California’s new four-tiered system, the following businesses can reopen indoors beginning Monday at 10% capacity:
- Gyms and fitness centers
Also, the state said the following services can be offered indoors at 25% capacity, or with a maximum capacity of 100 people (whichever would be less):
- Places of worship
- Movie theaters
- Dine-in service at restaurants
- Museums
The following places are allowed to reopen with modifications (no maximum capacity):
- Hair salons and barber shops
- Nail salons
Bars that do not serve meals will not be permitted to offer services indoors. And the tiered system will not affect K-12 schools, which are expected to be allowed to reopen sometime next week.
Health and safety protocols will still be mandatory, like facial coverings, social distancing and vigorous sanitization.
While business owners have expressed excitement at the reopenings, the county warns that the public must abide by public health orders.
“If people do not follow the rules and the strategies that we continue to share with you, the greater chances are that we will advance to Tier 1, which is the purple tier, and will go backwards and be very close to where we were in mid-July before the state imposed restrictive measures on counties across the state,” said Dr. Wilma Wooten, the county’s public health officer.
For more information on the coronavirus pandemic in San Diego County, click here.
