Board of Supervisors — 2020-07-07

Hello. I will call to order the July 7th, 2020 meeting of the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors. Would the clerk please call the roll?

Ms. Hartman? Here. Mr.. Mr. Lavinino? Here. Mr. Williams? Chair Hart?

The next item of business is approval of the minutes of the June 16th meeting. Is there any discussion? Do I have a motion to approve the minutes? Move approval. Second. Motion's been made in second, would the clerk please call the roll?

Ms. Hartman? Aye. Mr. Adams? Aye. Mr Lavinino? Aye Mr Williams? Aye Chair Hart?

Aye

Motion passes unanimously

CEO Miyasato is there a CEO report today

Good morning chair and board members. Yes, there is a two quick items one is just reminding the community that we are hosting six virtual community meetings this month on cannabis retail storefronts the first two were held last week Videos of each meeting are posted to the county's website Two more meetings are scheduled this week for community plan areas of Toro Canyon in Summerland On Wednesday and Orcutt on Thursday all meetings are scheduled to begin at 5 30 p.m The website includes links and phone numbers to participate in the meetings along with the presentation, the preview videos and links to interactive zoning and permitting maps. There's also a link for the public to submit questions or comments in advance. And the website is cannabis.countyofsb.org The second item I want to just remind everyone that We are accepting applications for the Citizens Independent Redistricting Commission.

As you know, Measure G established an 11-person County of Santa Barbara Citizens Independent Redistricting Commission to be commenced at the end of this year which will be tasked with adjusting the boundaries of the county's supervisory districts through an open and transparent process in accordance with federal and state criteria once the federal census data is received in mid 2021. Residents interested in serving Have until 5 PM on Friday, August 21st. That's August 21st to apply the ordinance qualifications and criteria are all on our website along with the application at countyofsb.org backslash redistricting. That's all I have chair.

Thank you. Madam clerk. Are there any announcements or changes to the agenda today?

Chair Hart and members of the board, I just have one quick announcement this morning. And that is to remind members of the public who are participating in our meeting today our alternative method of public comment for our board meeting as our chambers are still closed to the public. As you will see scrolling on top of your screen momentarily we have an option by phone if you would like to make a comment by phone please call the clerk of the Board at area code 805-568-2240 Again, that's 805-568-2240. And if you state your name, your phone number and which item you would like to speak on the clerk will call you at the appropriate time. I would also like to remind the public to please make every effort to be available and mute all streaming devices on their end once it is your turn to speak.

Thank you.

Next item is approval of the administrative agenda. Do any board members have any items that they'd like to pull off the administrative agenda?

None here.

Okay, thank you very much. Then do we have a...

Move approval of the administrative agenda.

Madam Clerk, you need to read something at the record.

Chair Hart and members of the Board, we do have one request on the administrative agenda by a member of the public on Administrative Item Number 41 And that is Mark Chantillo, and I will call him now. Administrative item number 41 is a set hearing request from Planning and Development. It is to set a hearing to consider recommendations regarding the county planning commission's recommended ordinance amendments to the County Land Use and Development Code, LUDC, and the Article 2 Coastal Zoning Ordinance, Article 2. To implement new development standards and permit requirements regarding certain commercial cannabis activities, which the board previously considered on June 2nd 2020 and June 11th 2020. This is a set hearing for our July 14th 2020 agenda date and it is estimated for two hours

Good morning, members of the board. This is Mark Cicillo. I wanted to just offer a comment and a request for item number 841. This is the set hearing for the cannabis ordinance amendments that your board considered on June 11th. This hearing is set for next week and I note that the board materials have not been posted or made available publicly yet. This puts the public and the community at a real disadvantage in understanding specifics about what's being proposed and in developing alternatives. And I would ask your board to make these materials available, post it available today if possible.

Normally they would be posted on Thursday. The deadline for written public comment is Friday at noon. So typically there's barely 24 hours for the public to be able to review and develop responses for your board And I think your board understands the importance of getting input from the community on all issues and in particular this issue. So, I would ask that the board direct staff to make this kind of information available more earlier in the process generally and for this matter to make it as available as early as possible today. Thank you.

Are there any other comments on the administrative agenda?

Chair Hart, members of the board that was our only request to speak on the administrative agenda. Thank you.

Can I please get a motion to approve the balance of the administrative agenda?

So moved.

Motion's been made. Is there a second? Second. Thank you. Any discussion? Would the clerk please call the roll?

Ms. Hartman? Aye. Mr. Adam?

Aye.

Mr Lavinino?

Aye!

Mr. Williams? Aye

I

motion passes unanimously

and I'm sure the staff will post the agenda items as soon as they are available. I see that director Plowman is here would you mind just we had a public comment asking that if it's possible to post the cannabis item sooner than the regularly scheduled time And I know your team is working hard to get that ready. Sorry to put you on the spot, Ms. Plummer.

No, Mr. Chair and members of the board. My staff is working diligently to get that information posted and we... The reason it wasn't posted as part of this set hearing is that we were working very quickly to try and come back before the boards break. But we will do everything we can to get it posted as quickly as possible. Thank

you very much. Appreciate that.

public comment today. Thank

you. The next item is department item number one. Would the clerk please read that item into the record.

Chair Hart, members of the board. Departmental item number one is from the County Executive Office. It is a hearing to consider recommendations regarding a coronavirus disease 2019 COVID-19 update.

Welcome Dr. DeRanosa.

Good morning. Good morning. This morning, I will be briefing your board on countywide data as well as giving you an update on the monitoring project status with CDPH. This graph describes our case status in the county for the last 14 days And I want to point out that there is a solid black line on June 30, denoting that this is when we did data migration from one database to another to improve our case investigation and to be in alignment with the state databases.

What's interesting or concerning is the upward trend in the number of total cases We started out 14 days previous on June 22nd at 2,446 cases and we ended on July 6th with 3,655. This denotes a 49% increase in our cases in 14 days. The second graph describes our new cases in the past two weeks, city by city. What is noteworthy is the trend for Santa Maria on 6-22 versus 7-6. That denotes an 84% increase.

The red line, which denotes the Santa Barbara trend and that is a 115% increase. So these increases are serious and concerning. I'd like to briefly point out the accessibility of data on our website. This is a snapshot of what's available on our website, we describe on a daily basis the cases, the new cases by the 10 geographic area, the confirmed cases The recovered cases as well as the active cases and lastly, the number of deaths attributed in each of those geographic areas.

This graph describes the hospital census. And as of yesterday, we have 69 patients hospitalized with 48 being in medical surgical beds and 21 being in the ICU. What I have introduced on this graph is what CDPH looks at when they look at our hospital census. So we might look at this graph and say, well there's only 69 hospitalized patients due to COVID so given that we have upwards of 800 beds in our hospital system, we're okay.

However, what the state does is that it takes into entirety the other beds that are occupied by elective surgeries, by other critical health care needs. So percent of medical surgical beds currently available is moderately concerning. It's at 33%. The percent of ICU beds currently available in our system is 49%. The number of ventilators currently available is 84%.

The percent of hospital with larger than 14 days of PPE on hand is only at 60%, and I'd like to pause here. When we were, when we saw that the 60% availability, we have submitted to the state for an additional set of PPE so that that particular hospital is adequately supplied. And we are working with that particular hospital just to make sure that they have what they need.

And again, we have 69 patients in the hospital. So the state looks at our county metrics and they have three ways to describe our metrics. One is less concerning. That means we're at the green. And when it becomes a warning, it's moderately concerning in the orange. And when it is serious, it is more concerning in the red and these are the descriptors that CDPH uses to describe our metrics. Our weekly community positivity rate hovers right at 8.3%.

And this is a snapshot of our status on the CDPH monitoring status. I'd like to go through the numbers, and then I'd like to talk about what the data means. So as of yesterday we have been on the monitoring status list for 21 days. We're doing well with the number of testing in our county at 238. However, the elevated disease transmission is at 207. Our testing positivity is at 8.3% and the increasing hospitalization, we meet the criteria at 9%. The number of ICU beds currently available is at 49%, and the number of ventilators currently available is at 84%.

So we look at disease transmission. We look at the average cases per day, per 100,000 population as well as our case rates and test positivity. So the state provides these metrics and this is how we are monitored through our reopening sectors. So these indicators tell us about the prevalence or burden of disease within our county and provides us with an indication of the volume of contact tracers needed to begin to box in the disease.

The elevated number of cases in our community is directly attributed to their freedom of movement as we reopened sectors, which provided increased opportunities for social interactions and gatherings Without physical distancing or face covering. Typically for each positive case, we can estimate up to 10 contacts so the average has been anywhere between 5 and 10 which will need to be investigated traced an isolated in order to break the disease transmission chain.

As of July 6, we have 398 active cases in our community. Currently our tracers are actively tracing 315 cases and 53 contacts. And I want to pause and just really acknowledge the incredible work that the disease contact tracing and investigation team has done. They have worked around the clock, without holidays and weekends, to make sure that we tackle the number of cases when they hit our system.

To address the current case rate and positivity, we have initiated the following actions. We have expedited the disease investigation process by assigning tracers to also do case investigation using the state sponsored CalConnect platform. We have 68 contact tracer, I'm sorry. We have 68 contact investigator contact tracer trained It's a new terminology that the state has given us so contact investigator contact tracer CICT as people transition to their previous job assignments we are additionally bringing we're adding additional tracers to continue the work in addition to that We have 15 contact investigator, contact tracers coming from the state this week. And another 15 following next week for a total of 30 additional contact investigator, contact tracers.

The expectation by this date is that our team will contact a case within three working days. Because of a current backlog due to delayed receipt of reports via CDPH reporting database, our current average is approximately 2.4 days after a case is received on our contact tracing platform investigated and contact tracing is complete. So even with the delay because of the incredible effort from our contact tracing team we are still Meeting the mark at 2.4 days on average, one staff can typically complete five cases including the investigation and all the contact tracing related to that case.

We now have enough tracers. We know we have enough tracers when we can beat even the state's expectation and Contact our cases within one to two days. So even though we meet the expectation, we hold ourselves to a higher standard and we hope to improve on that data. There's another reason contact tracing is so important. It gives us an indication of how disease is being spread in our community. From the cases that we have investigated, we see that 57% is related to person-to-person transmission, 1% is related to travel and 42% is community acquired.

The primary and most important mode of transmission for COVID-19 is through close contact from person to person. Community spread means the spread of an illness for which the source of infection is unknown. The cases are not sure how or where they became infected. So if you add the two percentages, 99% of the cases in our community became infected through coming into contact with a known case or exposed in the community to a case. What this means is that you must assume that everybody you come into contact is infectious and thereby need to take the precaution.

This means that you must wear a mask, you must socially distance, you must wash your hands and you must not touch your face. It means you must be sensitive to your surroundings and make smart informed choices about where you go and what you do. Reopening of business Not does not mean that the virus has been defeated. It means that we are working to find a balance in our community until virus is defeated, living with the virus established within our community means we must wear a mask and we must socially distance. We have no other defense at this time if we are to continue to reopen As a county, behavior must change. That behavior change will be seen in our disease transmission metrics and later in our hospitalization rates.

Hospitalization rates and capacity. Monitoring change to the number of individuals who are hospitalized for COVID-19 is another way to assess the burden of COVID-19 in our county. If more people are being hospitalized for COVID- 19, it is likely that the disease transmission is increasing although increasing in hospitalization rates are likely to lag by approximately two weeks. Unlike the case rates or testing positivity rate, the number of people hospitalized for COVID-19 is less likely to be influenced by how much testing is occurring. However, the number of patients currently hospitalized for COVID- 19 may be influenced by a number of factors such as age, race and ethnicity and underlying health conditions.

We are in daily communication with our hospitals and community weekly, with the hospital CEOs. And we are collaborating with our area hospitals for detailed demographics of COVID-19 hospitalized patients. We anticipate presenting the hospitalization data to your board in several weeks. Lastly, hospital capacity is a critical data point to track because it assesses our local healthcare system to care not only for COVID-19 patients but also the remainder of our community members with serious unexpected illness or those needing critical surgeries.

While the number of hospitalized patients are low at 69 patients yesterday taking into account that beds occupied by non-COVID patients This metric captures the remaining available beds should there be surge of patients needing to be hospitalized. Given the data, I'd like to now walk through what the Public Health Department is doing in partnership with our community partners.

We are doing extensive outreach as I mentioned previously. We are heavily invested in the Latinx and Indigenous Migrant COVID-19 Response Task Force This task force was stood up on March 24th at the beginning of our pandemic with our first meeting and previous to that with lots of planning. The task force is composed of a steering committee UCSB, Public Health, El Centro and our Language Justice Associate.

Since then the task force has formed a mental health working group to address unique needs in the community as well as the farm worker working group. These two working groups have an outreach and education component to make sure that community members are accessing mental health resources as well as the farm workers accessing resources. Through partnership with the various agencies on the task force, public health videos in indigenous languages were produced and amplified and transmitted by our partners.

Community grants have been obtained to support UCSB has a cadre of undergraduate students and graduate students supporting the effort through data gathering, and doing demographics, and GIS mapping, and assessing social determinants of health in particular in Santa Maria. And District 1 and District 5 staff have sponsored a public square equity project where there are, I believe over 10 language capacity among interns to do outreach and education particularly in Santa Maria.

In addition to that, We from the get go, we saw reports from other jurisdictions nationally and state about the disparate numbers in our black American community and Asian American community affected by COVID-19. We were approached by leaders in both communities about the need for us to also do prevention work, to also address disparities and social determinants of health. And we have begun that work. We have been meeting off and on and 10, we are planning to identify staff within the department that will liaison with these two communities in addition to continuing the work in our Latinx and indigenous community.

In addition to that, we have started meeting with ag sectors including the growers and the farm worker advocacy group. We have had I believe two meetings and I am joined in these meetings by our Ag Commissioner Kathy Fisher. Even though the state has offered us community testing it is restricted to three fixed locations So in addition to those three fixed locations, we have partnered with community healthcare providers and community-based organizations to provide focus weekend testing in Guadalupe and Cuyama. And we hope that these two efforts can guide and inform us for future testing sites throughout the county.

So along with outreach, we need to talk about education and enforcement. We have issued health officer orders and there has been a worry that who is able to enforce health officer orders? And Health and Safety Code 101029 provides broad authority for the sheriff and every peace officer of every political division of the county, meaning cities to enforce local health officer orders concerning COVID-19. So this gives us the bandwidth to be able to join in partnership to make sure that our health officer orders for sectors as well as the state health officer order for face covering and social distance occurs.

In addition to that, we have our environmental health services activities which means that our health Our environmental health services team has been out not only providing guidance, education for jurisdictions. For businesses that we typically have jurisdictional authority over but we've done it for all of the sectors. But in our normal course of business, we do go out to the restaurants, And provide that education and then progressively hold the places of business accountable to adhering to the social distancing and the face covering so that these sectors, these places can offer a safe workplace to their employees as well I am happy to report that Kelly and her team has been very strong in communication and partnership with the cities for their code enforcement activities.

So, that ends my update this week.

Thank you Dr. Doronis. Are there questions? Supervisor Williams?

Well, I appreciate Flushed out information on the contact tracing, and I think that's enormously important as you indicate. Is it possible for you to sort of subdivide that information? And are we asking questions of the community transmissions like have you been to any of the following in You know, week or two whatever doctors feel is the highest likelihood incubation period.

So that we might be able to have some better idea where our trouble spots might be. I guess my concern is that without and I'm really happy that the department is moving towards targeting the populations that are getting sick the most, but the public dialogue really in my view could shift our emphasis away from where we're getting the most infections and to something else. Right? And so I would want us to be able to as much as possible let the public know where we think most infections are and why based on that contact tracing. So if it's possible to subdivide the successful traces and even the ones, the traces that lead to community transmission have some stats on have they been to a restaurant in the last week? Maybe even the level of detail.

Have you been to a restaurant outside in the last week? Have you been in a restaurant inside in the last week? You know, if you've been to a bar, if you've been to the beach. Because I think otherwise the public is very alarmed right now, understandably so because particularly how large of increases other areas are experiencing and then because we are also experiencing an increase.

And I want us to remain focused on Where our trouble spots are. And so I think data helps guide us where our trouble spots are, but also helps the public know where their emphasis should be as well. Is that possible?

So for our contact tracing, we along with 34 other counties are using the state platform. So that state platform is pretty rigid in terms of having very specific questions that all the tracers have to go through. But I'm also interested in finding out about The impact of different sectors. So I'll bring it back to the team and see what creative solution we can come up with.

Appreciate that, and then I wanted to ask you if you've been able to read this letter from cause. Some of these issues are ones that we've talked about before but given the high incidence Transmission among farm workers, some of these seem like pretty reasonable things if we have the power to mandate them.

Right. So I read the letter after it was sent to your board and I've had several conversations with Hazel DeVos, and I think that what we can commit to which is explore the H2A housing she has offered a webinar to our staff so that we can I believe it's scheduled for Thursday. Positivity rates among farm workers is concerning and it is seen throughout, I think our state and other parts of the country. And so public health is interested in partnering with the community as well as with the ag sector to see what can we do to change the environment? What can we do in terms of changing the policies so that farm workers can thrive?

Given the sweeping powers that the public health officer has, I mean would you not be able to require agricultural employees to notify workers in Spanish and indigenous languages about taking sick leave if they're entitled to even if infected? And arrange for more frequent testing and screening of workers particularly before an H2A project is occupied. That's within.

Your ability.

Yes, and I believe that that is currently being done by the growers, but that's something that definitely we can explore with County Council to make sure that our health officer can issue orders. And I'm not sure even though the growers I know that the growers have measures in place for to control The disease and to make sure that the farm workers have pathways. I'm not sure who's jurisdictional authority to enforce it, but that's something that definitely we can explore with our county council to see is if they add commissioner? Is it Cal OSHA or is it public health and what is the extent that public health can do?

Well, I would encourage you even if it's duplicative of state law in this case to do so because at this point. You know it's not like Cal OSHA has enough bodies to really enforce it very well and. This is obviously a trouble spot for us and maybe more worth the time of some people You know, a vector that is not creating as many cases as this is. So I you know and even if most employers are doing it, you know, I think what we've dealt with before you and I about this is uniformity in the industry right? That you know responsible employers are already doing this but there may be some folks who aren't right and so I think that's maybe my concern and why I would encourage you and the health officer to, even if it is duplicative of state law. Consider this because you at least at this point in time, I'm not sure absent of a public health crisis but at this time we have a better ability to enforce than the state does.

Supervisor

Hartman?

I just wanted to mention that the dense housing situations are of concern. We've, of course, dealt with it at the jail, the prison, juvenile center, nursing homes but for farm workers, dormitories, students what are the best practices and what can we do to ensure that the best practices being adopted by landlords and others. So it goes across the board, and I think there are some legal questions and policy questions so I'm hoping we can work on that one.

Is there any other questions from Santa Maria?

No, not at this time. Thank you.

Thank you. The only thing I'd like to add then about outreach is that I appreciate all the things that you're doing and these are really important and they're delivering results But it's getting to me, in my mind it has come to the point where we should consider contracting with trusted messenger organizations to do additional outreach. There's only so many people that you have available to do this work and to organize these groups. And I think that engaging them formally in some fashion to have them have the financial assistance to do additional outreach. is a good idea at this point. You know, we're as Supervisor Williams mentioned, we have particular challenges in particular communities and communicating the vulnerabilities of individual populations to the virus.

And these are always challenging It's a challenging area to get the word out. And relying on trusted messengers and community organizations that already have those relationships, particularly in a crisis when we don't have the time to develop the expertise ourselves is really an asset that I think we should explore much more intensely. So I'd hope that you can consider that.

If that's it, thank you Dr. Dobermanosu. Appreciate your report. Ms. Anderson?

Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the board. We're here to brief you on a RISE business activity that has occurred since our last meeting with you for your board and the public. And I'll take just a minute for her to pop that up. So over the past week there's been quite a few changes indicated from the state that we've had to incorporate into our county Indoor operations were closed for dine-in restaurants, wineries, tasting rooms, movie theaters, family entertainment centers, zoos and museums and card rooms.

All operations were closed unless serving food as a meal within transaction for brew pubs, breweries, bars, pubs and lounges. Additionally, the state added recreational team sports to their not permitted list. That was previously not listed on any category. The public health order change that supported the indoor and closure of the bar sectors was the County Health Order 2020-12.3 and that was issued July 2nd.

We did want to clarify some amended guidance specifically for the beverage industry. Our beverage industry includes wineries and tasting rooms, brew pubs, breweries, bars and lounges. There is a distinction however. For wineries and tasting rooms it is closed to indoor operations. Outdoor operations and pickup are still permitted but they are not required to serve food with their transactions.

Brew pubs, breweries, bars and lounges are different. They are closed to both indoor and outdoor operations unless they're operating with serving meals in transaction, very similar and consistent with dine-in restaurant guidelines. They are being allowed to have temporary emergency food permits from the Environment Health Department, similar to what wineries and tasting rooms were allowed several weeks ago.

So they can contact the EHS department. We do have this on the website, the application in order for them to do this. So where are we at now? We are still under stage three, but we're modifying it weekly. Now can't quite see it, but everything in red is indicative of additional guidance from the state. So this is just indicating that we do have a change in dine-in restaurants under stage two and we are now bifurcating essentially the stage three and stage four sectors.

Just a reminder to your board and the public, we do have a living document with the rise guide. And that has changed one to two times a week depending on what activity is going on at the state level. We are on our website allowing for businesses to continue to self-certify depending on when their sector is open. Additionally, for example of our sector who may have to now self certify under a dine in restaurant criteria. Businesses are required to review the state and local guidance, complete the prevention plan and self certify that they can open safely.

So our numbers now are about 3,533 for the countywide. Predominantly in the city areas and we do have some that are incorporated. The largest sectors are continuing to be dine-in restaurants, retail and office workspaces countywide Our RISE ambassadors continue to be out in our community and are assisting now some of the city teams in order to get trained and provide that training and education out to our businesses, and it's been very popular throughout the community.

We also have our Small Business Community Partnership Enhancement Program. This is your board approved two ways for businesses to expand out into their surrounding area. One through public rights of ways another through private property. We have had some interest especially now that a lot of dine-in restaurants and other facilities are closed to indoor Facilities so moving outside makes sense for some of them In regard to the private property in parking lots, we know that some have taken advantage of that However, they aren't required to notify the planning department for about 30 days So we know that those will be coming in soon All of this information and information for the businesses are available on our RecoverySBC.org website. It's continually updated, and we try to provide the most current information that we can in order to keep businesses apprised of what the changing issues are.

Here's some of the contact information. Our environmental health team that has led in really answering a lot of questions in our gray area at ehsadmin at sbcphd.org, very responsive and have been phenomenal in responding to our business questions. With that I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Are there any questions for Ms. Anderson? I had a question just about,

oh

no go ahead Supervisor Lavinino.

Thank you Mr. Chair. I appreciate all the great report. Just a question that I've been getting from different business owners up here is are we looking at other type of permit relief? Anything that, and I know we've done as far as expanding into public right of way. But just overall even as low as talking about replacing people's water heaters that we have a fee on top of.

As the county as a whole looking at just all types of fee relief reductions You know, as we go through a time when people are really struggling. And I don't know if that's really under your purview Nancy or if it's something we've got to discuss on a broader level is the board but there's just a lot of business folks out there that are you know struggling to keep their doors open and be nice to have a plan of attack of how we can while still You know, maintaining our integrity of supporting the taxpayer. But we've also got to look at ways that we can help out in this situation.

Supervisor Lavinino through the chair. Great comments about that so we can certainly look and see what some of the other counties and jurisdictions are doing. We have so far been fairly consistent with our cities but that's a great idea. We can certainly look into that.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Supervisor Lavendino. I had a question just to highlight there was a lot of confusion at the end of last week with the beverage industries and the state guidance. And I think it wasn't clear to the public that the state changed its guidance multiple times in very short period of time And if you could just explain that and kind of put a highlight on the complexity of what we're dealing with, and how quickly the state is issuing guidance. Changing that guidance and expecting us to be able to turn around that instantly to accommodate the needs of local businesses. I'd appreciate that help.

Chair Hart, I think if Dr. DeRuonosa can respond to that there she's in constant contact with CDPH and she can give you a flavor what that was like.

Yes, so there was a lot of confusion because it went from a Sunday night call on the list of expectations from the state to when the actual guidance. The first guidance was set The guidance that was sent to us confirming the change on Thursday night at 10 PM and so we quickly, so the previous guidance said all bars. And

even that word guidance I think is confusing because it isn't guidance. It's mandate from the state and so all of these words add to the confusion of the public. The governor goes on television And has a press conference at noon on Thursday and says words that are easy to understand bars and when restaurants will be closed

right

then later that day you actually get. The mandate that comes from the State Department of Public Health, it turns those words that are English into legal words. Right. That are more precise and go ahead with the rest

of the story. Yes so that legal letter said that all bars brew pubs operations both indoors and outdoor operations must cease. So in writing the health officer order we looked at what was previously Issue that made the allowance, but you know if food dine-in food options are done then they can open But with the latest it did not have that pathway so County Council and public health Debated that issue and we finally said the state said All operations indoors and outdoors must cease.

And so we issued the health officer order, and ABC had reached out to industry leaders and said no, I think we'll change. We'll make that allowance still happen but CDPH did not communicate that to us until Thursday night at 10 o'clock. I know because it was one of those rare nights that I went to bed early and I woke up and I'm like, oh my gosh something came out while I was asleep. And so we quickly pivoted environmental health in working with Nancy and we thought what is the most reasonable way that we can accommodate?

We had made that allowance, that pathway. We issued a letter to our beverage industry leaders and engaged Nancy in that messaging as well, as well as our JIC in doing that. And so we were able to reach to our community and make that allowance. And yesterday we cleaned up and amended our health officer order Thank

you for that. I think that does not get communicated clearly to the public about how difficult this is to respond to the mandates from the state. And how in this instance there was no advance warning, there wasn't consultations from the California Department of Public Health that these things were going to happen. Absolutely understandable given you know how dynamic the nature of this pandemic is and you know the governor's looking at a lot of different inputs around the state and all of those folks are understandably concerned as different circumstances in different states but or different parts of the state but You know, I'm sure people who are not involved in government think that this is all seamless and it's easy. And that the state mandates are clearly communicated to local governments that are easily executed.

That is not the case. This is extraordinarily not that system. And I think that that's important to communicate to the public. That we're doing the best we can in rapidly changing conflicting Advice from different state agencies, not even advice. I fall in that same trap too. Conflicting mandates from different state agencies on the same subject at the same time that have to be resolved.

And all the counties are facing the same thing, and all of the county public health officers are communicating to the Department of Public Health about these challenges.

I think what made this situation difficult was that it came on the eve of a holiday weekend and so the staff on Friday had it off. But our environmental health services staff were amazing. They came back and did the work and transmitted the change that morning.

Good, well thank you for that. Supervisor Williams and then Supervisor Harmon?

I was just going to say that I think that's so important for people to understand This is extraordinarily ad hoc. If I could sum up, you put it so much more in a fun way and I love you more every day for it but it's like it's very ad hoc. It's like we get this and people think we might get it in writing before it's on a press conference but we don't. Yeah,

well said. Thank you. Supervisor

Hartman? Mr Chair I just wanted you to add if we don't comply with the guidance mandates then there are serious consequences to our county and you can elaborate on that but I just wanted to say I don't think we can say enough but we're hearing such wonderful things about our public health department And our RISE program, the ongoing nature of this makes it really, really hard. And you keep stepping up, your staff keeps stepping up and people really appreciate it so thank you. Thank you.

Thank you for that. Yes there are significant, Mr. Gazzani I think you were poised and ready to talk about what the state has as an enforcement tool.

Well, I think it really goes into two categories. Hard to say which is most important but from the business perspective if the county does not go through its own local health order process the state public health officer puts out her own order which is actually much less agile in reopening so it's another thing that has to change before we can reopen And that's been the experience of some other counties around the state when they didn't move quickly enough with local health officer orders to adapt to a changing mandate from the state. The state issued its own mandates that then need to be undone before you can then further loosen when the conditions improve. So I think that the approach that Santa Barbara County is taking although more labor-intensive is actually Provides quicker results on the ground for reopening.