Sonoma County to reopen barbershops, hair salons and shopping malls on Monday

Sonoma County will allow barbershops, hair salons and shopping malls to resume indoor operations with modifications on Monday, county health officials said Sunday.

They are taking the action in accordance with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s new business reopening strategy amid the coronavirus pandemic, local officials said. The county’s move also will coincide with the state’s beginning of a four-stage process to determine how and when California’s 58 counties will continue to proceed during the pandemic with local resumption of commercial and public activities.

Called a Blueprint for a Safer Economy, the state’s reopening plan places counties into one of four levels of virus containment and relies on two public health metrics for tracking progress to enable locales to gradually restart business operations. The four tiers are widespread, substantial, moderate and minimal virus spread.

On Monday, Sonoma County will start with a group of 38 counties in the category of widespread virus transmission, meaning they are struggling most to contain COVID-19. Counties in this category are under the tightest state public health restrictions. It’s expected to take a month or longer for Sonoma County to tamp down virus spread enough to advance into the next stage of reopening, Health Officer Sundari Mase said Friday.

Late Sunday, county health officials reported two more virus-related fatalities, increasing the pandemic death toll to 80 victims since March. No information about the victims was immediately available.

Earlier Sunday, Mase confirmed the county would abide by the new business reopening guidelines Newsom announced Friday. State law does allow local health officers to impose even stricter public health rules than those imposed by state officials, but not less restrictive.

Mase said reopening barbershops and hair salons posed no significant public health threat to people. Barbershops and hair salons initially closed, along with most other area businesses in mid-March at the onset of the pandemic. They were allowed to reopen June 13, then a month later were forced to close again because the virus came roaring back in the community.

“We feel comfortable in opening up this sector of our economy as the data show we’ve had only a handful of cases from indoor salons,” Mase said. “But we still have a ways to go before we will be able to move to the next tier and allow more activities to reopen under the state’s blueprint.”

The state’s new reopening process focuses on two key metrics for gauging a community’s success battling the virus: daily cases per 100,000 residents averaged over seven days and testing positivity percentage. That’s the percentage of overall COVID-19 tests that come back positive. As of Sunday, 101,628 of the county’s nearly 500,000 residents have been tested for the coronavirus.

Sonoma County has a virus transmission rate of 15.9 daily new cases per 100,000 residents and test positivity rate of 6.5%, according to the state’s new rules. To progress to the next less restrictive tier ‒ substantial transmission — the county would have to reduce its rate to seven new cases per 100,000 residents and maintain a testing positivity rate of between 5% and 8%.

Counties are allowed to ease business restrictions as virus circulation improves. But counties are required to remain in each of the four categories for three weeks before being eligible to move to a less restrictive stage.

Based on the total requirements of the governor’s new directive, it’s possible but unlikely in two or three months the county will be able to progress to a point of only having minimal business restrictions. And “minimal” under these rules would allow restaurants and wineries only to resume indoor service at half capacity.

For more information about the new state’s new reopening process, click here; and for information on state restrictions imposed on Sonoma County, click here and enter Sonoma. The state website reminds people to check their county’s respective COVID-19 website for local restrictions. For Sonoma County’s COVID-19 orders, click here.

You can reach Staff Writer Martin Espinoza at 707-521-5213 or martin.espinoza@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @pressreno.