While most of the high-profile reopening pushes have come from Republican governors, most notably Texas Gov. Greg Abbot and Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp — who have both faced heavy fire from Democrats and left-leaning media outlets for their attempts to get residents “back to work” — some Democratic governors are also making moves to begin the process of returning to some degree of “normalcy” after the economy-devastating widespread lockdowns.
In an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday, the day Colorado’s initial “Stay At Home” order officially expired, Colorado’s Democratic Gov. Jared Polis defended his decision to move forward with reopening plans, citing a need to shift to something more “sustainable” — both “economically” and “psychologically.”
While Polis said that, of course, he would love to have “next week’s information and next month’s information” today, that’s simply “not the world we live in — we have to make the best informed decisions, based on data and science, with the information we have,” he said, as reported by Politico.
While Tapper brought up the “theoretical” potential for more deaths as a result of the easing of social distancing measures, Polis defended the state’s staged reopening by repeatedly emphasizing the concept of sustainability. The current lockdowns, he suggested are ultimately not “sustainable.”
“What we know is that what matters a lot more than the date that the stay-at-home ends is what we do going forward, and … how we have an ongoing, sustainable way, psychologically, economically, and from a health perspective, to have the social distancing we need at workplaces, where people recreate, and across the board,” Polis said. “Otherwise, if we can’t succeed in doing that on an ongoing basis, the stay-at-home was for nothing. It doesn’t accomplish anything, if it’s not replaced with practices that are sustainable for the weeks and months that it’s likely to remain with us.”
Underscoring that his administration is of course worried about “a potential for a second spike,” the governor stressed that they are “laser-focused” on “how we can endure and sustain these kinds of social distancing measures … and how we can do that over a period of months in a psychologically sustainable way, and, of course, an economically sustainable way that meets the health goals of the state.”
With the expiration of Polis’s “Stay At Home” order, Colorado will now shift to its “second phase,” called “Safer At Home,” in which the state will allow certain types of businesses to reopen and some elective medical procedures to resume, so long as certain safety measures are enacted by the businesses and medical facilities. CPR News provides some more details on Colorado’s “Safer At Home” phase:
Under the next phase of Colorado’s COVID-19 response, billed as “Safer At Home” by Polis, retail businesses can reopen with curbside pickup on Monday. As of now, retail shops will then be allowed to reopen their doors to customers on Friday with strict precautions. On May 4, commercial businesses can open with up to 50 percent of employees working in-person.
Critical and non-critical businesses and retailers with over 50 employees in one location should implement symptom screening like temperature checks. Gatherings of 10 people or more are still not allowed.
Elective surgeries may resume, also under certain restrictions, and the order governing that makes clear that healthcare facilities that do resume those procedures have “a plan to reduce or stop elective surgeries or procedures if there is a surge of COVID-19 infections in the county or municipality in which the facility is located.”
Related: Texas Governor Begins To Reopen State; Democrats Condemn His ‘Hoax’ Plan
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