COVID-19: Is Lancaster County ready to reopen?

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The City of Lancaster is experiencing pushback from residents to reopen. The county's republican delegation sent a letter, on May 9th, to Governor Wolf asking to move the city into the "yellow" phase of his reopening plan.

As many Governor's around the United States have been taking charge in the response to COVID-19; plans on "reopening states" and allowing non-essential businesses and public gatherings to occur vary state by state. Government officials are taking into account the population of the infected and the resources available to help when creating reopening plans.

My reopening plan for Pennsylvania is gradual and prioritizes health and public safety.

The politicians who are encouraging counties to reopen prematurely are putting all of us at risk of resurgence.

Here is our measured approach to reopening, advised by health experts. ⤵ pic.twitter.com/iyBOOlh725

— Governor Tom Wolf (@GovernorTomWolf) May 11, 2020

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf has created a three-phase plan to help transition the state. The phases are as follows: red, yellow and green. The red phase is the most critical with: a stay at home order in place, essential businesses open, school and child care facilities being closed, no large gatherings and restaurants only allowing take-out and delivery.

The yellow phase is the beginning of reopening with fewer restrictions. In this phase, there isn't a stay at home order but social distancing will be aggressively enforced. Remote work will be encouraged for jobs that apply but child care and retail will open with protective measures. Restaurants will still be limited to take out and delivery but gatherings of 25 people or less will be allowed.

The last phase, the green phase, is the all-clear abiding by what the CDC suggests and lifting aggressive mitigation tactics.

In the letter sent to Governor Wolf, the Lancaster Republican delegates wrote asking to move Lancaster into the yellow phase. As elected officials, they stated that they are ready to move forward with reopening the county, with or without the Governor's approval.

Written in the opening paragraph is "We, as a county, are prepared to do so on Friday, May 15, 2020. We prefer to act with your cooperation, but we intend to move forward with a plan to restore Lancaster County."

The only statistics cited in the letter were the number of hospital patients who are positive with the virus; Lancaster General Hospital with 43 cases and Ephrata with two cases. They cite that the hospitals "report an ample supply of beds and ventilators, so much so, that they are resuming normal operations."

  

On the City of Lancaster Facebook Page, Mayor Danene Sorace, posted a response to the letter raising important questions like "Does the County have a plan to increase testing countywide? No. Has the County implemented county-wide contact tracing? No. Does the County have an early warning system in place so that we can continue to ensure our health care systems do not become overwhelmed in the future? No."

Addressing the concerns of residents and the details in the letter, Mayor Sorace went LIVE on Facebook to talk about what the city will be doing to move forward. Mayor Sorace has been transparent with the public since the stay at home order was placed in Lancaster County by "Going LIVE at 5pm" on the city's Facebook page.



During this LIVE, Mayor Sorace began listing current and up-to-date statistics. She says that there are 2,556 confirmed cases in the county and 134 cases just over this past weekend. Also citing her sources by stating that these stats are coming directly from the county coroner's office.

Later the Mayor was joined by Marty Siegal, a lawyer at Barley Snyder. Siegal served as a legal reference to answer questions that people were having regarding the state of the county. The first question that was asked, "Who gets to decide whether these stay at home orders stay in effect?" His response - the Governor decides.

Siegal warns that employers and businesses considering to operate during this time should be wary of the consequences. Some counties, including Lancaster, have decided that they will not prosecute violations. However, the state is able to take direct enforcement action in the form of citations and has the ability to revoke certifications, permits, and licenses.

Also, businesses that re-open could be susceptible to liability. The example used was, if an employee contracts COVID-19 and it is traced back to the business; some insurance policies have clauses for operating against the law and are able to deny coverage.

In conclusion, the Mayor said that the county is not ready to reopen at this time and the city will not be moving along with this plan to reopen on Friday, May 15th. The city will continue to abide by the Governor's orders.

The Mayor did mention that the Economic Development Company is working on an Economic Recovery Plan that can be viewed here.