What California’s new tier-based reopening plan means for the Central Coast

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (KION)

Governor Gavin Newsom announced a new, colored-coded, tier-based reopening plan for the state on Friday, but also allowed many business sectors to open with modifications, statewide. Starting on Monday - all retail, shopping centers at maximum 25% capacity, and hair salons and barbershops can operate indoors. However, each county can decide to have a more restrictive reopening plan.

Counties will now fall under one of four tiers: minimal (yellow), moderate (orange), substantial (red) and widespread (purple). What tier each county is in determined by their daily COVID-19 case rate and test positivity rate.

"Purple" counties have the highest restrictions, with many sectors like personal care services, restaurants, gyms/fitness centers, and houses of worship still "outside operations" only. Monterey, Santa Cruz and San Benito counties are are in the purple category.

• Minimal tier (yellow) counties: less than 2% of COVID-19 tests come back positive, and less than 1 daily case per 100,000 people.
• Moderate tier (orange) counties are seeing no more than 4.9% of their tests come back positive, and 1 - 3.9 daily cases per 100,000 people.
• Substantial tier (red) counties are seeing a positivity rate that is anywhere between 5% and 8%, and 4 - 7 daily cases per 100,000 people
• Widespread tier (purple) counties are seeing more than 8% of their tests come back positive, and more than 7 daily cases per 100,000 people.

Counties will be re-assessed every week.

This changed plans for Santa Cruz County, because under the "monitoring list" system, Friday was the day the county was off the list for two weeks - allowing them to open more areas, which would have included worship, fitness centers and personal care services. That is now no longer the case.

Santa Cruz, however, believes they will be moved from the "purple" to "red" tier on September 8th, due to meeting the "red" criteria. This would allow indoor operations for worship, fitness centers and personal care services.

87% of Californians are currently living in purple tier counties.

In order for a county to move into a different tier, it must meet that tier's criteria for two straight weeks. Counties looking to move into a less severe tier (i.e. a purple tier county looking to become a red tier county) must remain in their current tier for at least three weeks before they can move into a new tier and expanded stage of reopening.