Also: Getting creative for gatherings.
 | | A public art installation was aimed at turning boarded-up shopfronts into works of art in Los Angeles. The initiative was started by the street artist Jeremy Novy and Art Share L.A.Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images |
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On Tuesday, state leaders unveiled the most detailed timeline yet for how the state plans to reopen schools, businesses and public spaces. |
“We’re beginning to have much more public conversations about opening up, with modifications,” Gov. Gavin Newsom told Californians in his daily briefing. “The virus has not gone away.” |
And some loosening of restrictions could be weeks, not months, away, Mr. Newsom said, once again warning that any easing of stay-at-home orders is contingent on officials’ ability to quickly put them back into place if case counts start to rise. |
“If our behavior radically changes, we risk the framework we’re advancing,” he said. |
But we still don’t have specific dates. |
Here’s what else you need to know: |
The process of reopening will take place in four phases. |
- We’re still in Stage 1, said Dr. Sonia Angell, the state’s head of public health. That means government and private organizations are working to make it more consistently safe for essential workers, like grocery store employees or nurses. Those workers need more protective equipment and a more robust testing and tracing system.
- Stage 2 will be when some lower-risk businesses and public spaces can reopen, also with modifications to allow for distancing. Those include workplaces like factories, with more spaced-out work stations, or nongrocery retail stores, but with curbside pickup. Schools and child care facilities would also be reopened during this phase. Dr. Angell added that workers must have enough of a financial safety net — including paid sick days — to take time off if they have Covid-19.
- Stage 3 will be when higher-risk businesses will be able to reopen — again, with modifications. This includes nail and hair salons, gyms, movie theaters and sports without live audiences, as well as in-person religious services.
- And Stage 4 will be the end of the state’s stay-at-home order. That will be when concerts, conventions and sports with a live crowd will be allowed to reopen.
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Conventions, sports with spectators, and big concerts are still a long way from coming back. |
Mr. Newsom said Stage 2 was weeks away. The third and fourth phases, he said, are months away. |
But unlike in any of the other phases, Stage 4 will be allowed only once treatments or a vaccine have been developed. |
“Being back at concerts and convention halls with tens of thousands of fans will take some time,” Mr. Newsom said. |
Schools may reopen sooner than expected, but they will be very different. |
Mr. Newsom emphasized that reopening schools and child care facilities is not only critical for students, who have suffered “learning loss” in recent months, but also for getting parents back to work. |
But state officials have said that, barring a vaccine or herd immunity, schools won’t be able to open to students until everyone — kids, teachers and staff — can be safe. |
There may be staggered classes, with one day on and one day off, my colleagues reported. In Los Angeles, home to the nation’s second-largest public school system, Austin Beutner, the superintendent, said there would have to be “robust” testing and contact tracing in place for schools to reopen. |
[Read more about what schools may look like this fall.] |
The state’s stay-at-home order is a floor, not a ceiling. |
Mr. Newsom has fielded calls from local leaders, particularly in smaller rural counties where the virus has taken less of a toll, to allow them to ease restrictions more quickly. |
On Tuesday, he acknowledged the varying needs of communities across California, and said that as the state as a whole gets closer to reopening, there may be ways for individual counties or cities to move more quickly — but on a case-by-case basis in coordination with the state. |
“We’re not going to just blithely do that,” he said, adding that there needs to be more capacity for surveillance testing to monitor for outbreaks before some communities are allowed to reopen. |
On the other hand, if regions — like Los Angeles or the Bay Area, where there have been more cases — keep in place stricter measures than the state’s, the state’s order won’t pre-empt them. |
We often link to sites that limit access for nonsubscribers. We appreciate your reading Times coverage, but we also encourage you to support local news if you can. |
 | | Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, where doctors will give a sex hormone to men sick with Covid-19.Jake Michaels for The New York Times |
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- Women are less likely to become acutely ill and less likely to die from the coronavirus than men. So doctors, including at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, are racing to figure out if sex hormones like estrogen could help save men’s lives. [The New York Times]
- Hospitals have been forced to cancel physical therapy and other nonemergency procedures and services. Now, some Bay Area hospitals are slashing workers’ pay. [The San Francisco Chronicle]
- Two Inland Empire men have been accused of trying to sell a stockpile of face masks for $4 million — except the masks didn’t exist. [The New York Times]
- A Vallejo planning commissioner resigned after throwing his cat on camera during a Zoom meeting. He was also heard using an epithet. [The New York Times]
- As movie theaters across the world remain closed, the motion picture academy announced that for the first — and maybe only — time, a film can skip a theatrical release entirely and still be eligible for the Oscars. [The New York Times]
- See pictures of the neon blue waves, sometimes known as sea sparkle, lighting up Southern California’s darkened coastline. [The Los Angeles Times]
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 | | The lasagna, rich and satisfying.Aya Brackett for The New York Times |
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I started the week mourning the loss of meals shared among friends and strangers at places like the historic Noriega Hotel in Bakersfield, whose owners recently announced the restaurant wouldn’t reopen. |
But as the lockdowns wear on, people continue to come up with creative ways to gather. |
Samin Nosrat, the Bay Area-based chef and author, wrote for The Times about how much she misses the satisfaction of throwing an intimate, unpretentious dinner party. So, instead, she’s inviting anyone and everyone to join her for a grand lasagna dinner on Sunday — online. Make a vegan version, make it for yourself and save the rest; it’s adaptable. |
For the millions around the world celebrating Ramadan, there will be, as Wajahat Ali wrote in an Opinion piece, some amount of improvisation in figuring out how to break fasts — perhaps socially distanced potluck iftars with food left on doorsteps. |
In Los Angeles, the Muslim-Jewish interfaith group NewGround is hosting its annual community iftar Thursday night on Facebook live. |
Jill Cowan grew up in Orange County, graduated from U.C. Berkeley and has reported all over the state, including the Bay Area, Bakersfield and Los Angeles — but she always wants to see more. Follow along here or on Twitter. |
California Today is edited by Julie Bloom, who grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from U.C. Berkeley. |
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