‘Ambiguity’ of Newsom’s stay-at-home order takes Stanislaus County officials by surprise
Top officials in Stanislaus County said they won’t likely step up enforcement to comply with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s order for California residents to stay home to slow the spread of coronavirus illness.
Sheriff Jeff Dirkse assured the public, in a Facebook post Thursday evening, that no one will be arrested locally for violating the governor’s order.
The sheriff said Friday his post was in response to an immediate public reaction he received to Newsom’s order — what does a lockdown mean? Is the National Guard coming? Are you going to arrest people? He said state agencies didn’t provide any clarifications Friday on how to enforce the order.
“Before the governor was done with the press conference, my phone was blowing up,” Dirkse said. One hindrance to enforcing the order are the different state and federal definitions for the 16 critical sectors that are exempted.
“There is still ambiguity around what we are expected to enforce and what we are not,” Dirkse said, adding that the “governor does not want us to arrest people. … I don’t expect there will be any enforcement around it.”
Following an alarming projection Thursday that more than half the state’s population could catch the potentially deadly respiratory illness in the next two months, Newsom ordered everyone to stay home except to get food, care for a loved one, receive health care or work at an essential job.
The governor’s stay-home order doesn’t apply to employees who are needed to maintain continuity of critical government services, schools, childcare and construction or play an essential role for sectors including transportation, commercial facilities, banks, communications, dams, energy and food and agriculture.
Newsom later said his prediction of 25.5 million cases was a worst case scenario if nothing is done to combat outbreaks.
Stanislaus County CEO hears from residents
County Chief Executive Officer Jody Hayes said Friday morning the county had already heard from community members asking for county action against nonessential businesses that remained open. Hayes said he doesn’t expect the county will be interpreting whether a private enterprise is essential or nonessential under Newsom’s order.
“I want the public to know that is not our role.” Hayes said, adding. “Our law enforcement agency is not patrolling the streets to see if someone is not meeting the standards of the governor’s order last night.”
Both Hayes and Dirkse stressed that their doubts about enforcement of Newsom’s order does not minimize the guidance from multiple agencies for people to stay home if possible and take precautions to keep from spreading COVID-19.
Hayes noted that local government agencies were not given advance notice of the governor’s announcement. On Friday, the county’s leadership staff was trying to determine what services and functions in the county’s 27 departments are deemed essential or nonessential.
Some essential services are provided in each county department, Hayes noted.
To deal with the pandemic, Stanislaus County has been disrupted by temporary closure of entertainment venues, private businesses, schools and recreational facilities, and cancellation of numerous public events from the Modesto Marathon to Love Modesto.
Still, there were plenty of stores open and traffic on streets in Modesto the day after Newsom urged people to stay in their homes. The video game retailer, Gamestop, has reportedly decided its stores in many cities will stay open, despite coronavirus outbreaks, even if law enforcement shows up at the door.
The Modesto City Council on Thursday adopted a resolution advising residents to stay home if possible until April 6 or until further notice. The city resolution stopped short of a mandatory “shelter in place” order that’s been imposed in some California counties where there are clear signs of community transmission of COVID-19.
Then came the governor’s order to impose home confinement statewide.
Modesto Mayor Ted Brandvold responds
Modesto Mayor Ted Brandvold said Friday the city was reviewing the governor’s order. It “doesn’t seem different from the action taken by the City Council earlier, except it is an order and not advisory action,” Brandvold said in a text message. “We believe it was important to act quickly and clearly and so does the state.”
Brandvold answered “no” when asked if the city would take additional steps to enforce the governor’s order.
Modesto’s resolution advised people to stay home to “the maximum extent feasible” and practice social distancing, such as six-feet separation from other folks, when not at home.
In a Facebook post, Modesto Police Chief Galen Carroll said the governor himself did not want his stay-at-home order to become a law enforcement issue and “neither do we.” Carroll said the governor was fairly clear in asking for public cooperation and peer pressure for people to comply with the order.
“This will pass soon enough,” Carroll wrote. “We all just want to get back some normalcy in our daily lives. So please, just be smart and stay home unless it’s essential.”
City spokesman Thomas Reeves said the city is not in a position to shut down restaurants or other businesses that bring together a significant number of customers. He said the county health officer, not the city, has authority to force closure of restaurants through an emergency order.
San Francisco County’s ‘shelter-in-place’
San Francisco’s county order issued Monday to “shelter in place” for three weeks, among other things, ordered restaurants and cafes to close except for takeout and delivery and included the closure of gyms and recreation facilities. Businesses and government agencies were told to cease non-essential operations.
According to San Francisco’s action, failure to comply could result in a misdemeanor and penalties including a fine, jail sentence or both. Similar penalties are inherent in the public health order that accompanied Newsom’s announcement.
Stanislaus County’s CEO said that Bay Area counties that have imposed such stringent orders are struggling with a much larger number of coronavirus cases and community transmission of the virus. Coronavirus outbreaks have killed more than 10,000 people worldwide.
“We have one confirmed case of community transmission, which is much a different scenario than what we’ve seen in other communities,” Hayes said.
Many county employees at the Tenth Street Place center downtown are telecommuting, and procedures have changed to minimize contacts with the public that might spread the respiratory illness.
A sign outside the front doors of Tenth Street Place says the public lobby is closed and provides a phone number for making arrangements to conduct business by phone, online or through the mail. A customer or vendor might arrange to drop off something to a county employee at the curb.
Other offices including the Agricultural Commissioner, county Aging & Veterans Services and senior and community centers are closed, but certain services are still provided by phone or electronic means.
It remains to be seen if the local measures and voluntary compliance from residents will keep the COVID-19 caseload from exploding here.
New cases in the Bay Area generated headlines Friday, including six more in San Francisco, pushing the total to 76, San Mateo reaching 100 cases and Santa Clara with almost 200 cases including eight deaths. Stanislaus County remained at five cases.
Modesto Bee staff writer Kevin Valine contributed to this report.
This story was originally published March 21, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
