Interim City Manager Miranda Lutzow made it clear that the decision to reopen the Manteca economy will be driven by data.
Lutzow, explained in a video posting on the city’s Facebook page Monday evening that data shows there would be a second and even more deadly wave of COVID-19 infections within 180 days if everything was allowed to reopen after a 30-day shut down.
Lutzow made her remarks hours after a 5 p.m. release by the county’s chief health officer Maggie Park put the number of confirmed cases so far in San Joaquin County at 446 with 18 deaths.
There have been 33,865 confirmed cases and 1,227 deaths in California.
Nationally, the number of confirmed cases stands at 746,626 with 39,083 deaths as of Monday at 5 p.m.
“We’re not going from a red light to a red light,” Lutzow said. “We are going to go to a yellow light — a proceed with caution.”
The city will rely on direction from both Gov. Gavin Newsom and the county health department to guide efforts to reopen the Manteca economy. That is the approach Ventura County used Monday to decide to re-open golf courses in their jurisdiction while they remain closed in neighboring counties such as Los Angeles.
Lutzow said local official are working on a re-opening plan to get people back to work. The first things the city may bring back are day camps and sports camps.
She stressed the new norm will still require social distancing and other measures.
The city is preparing re-opening kits for businesses that will include posters and such that would need to be placed to advise customers and employees on how to conduct themselves.
Staff, at the City Council’s direction, is formulating a small business grant program aimed at helping get people back to work. It could be used to purchase equipment to allow employees to work at home or possibly reconfigure business space to comply with social distancing requirements.
The council during a special meeting last week identified $303,606 in funds budgeted from completed projects that had money left over or projects that they opted to postpone to help fund a program to help small businesses cope with the pandemic.
The City of Manteca emergency command center is operating daily from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. to try and answer what questions they can from citizens emailing or calling in as well as to monitor the ongoing situation.
The phone number for questions related to the coronavirus emergency is 456-8854 while the email is eocinfo@mantecagov.com
The City of Manteca is also maintaining a coronavirus update site on its website at ci.manteca.ca.us
