As expected, the current shelter-in-place order for the Bay Area has been extended for nearly a month, and with it comes new regulations for the restaurants and grocery stores still in operation during the pandemic.
According to a joint announcement from the six participating counties: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, and Santa Clara, as well as the city of Berkeley (which operates its own Department of Public Health), the new end date for the order is Sunday, May 3 — a change from the Friday, May 1 extension that was previously touted, and a far cry from the initial April 7 end date.
Also new are restrictions on businesses termed essential that are therefore allowed to remain open. Under the new order (here’s Santa Clara’s, the language other than the county name is the same for all), which goes into effect as of 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, March 31, restaurants may remain open for takeout and delivery as they have been since the initial order on March 16.
However, now those places — as well as grocery and food stores, which are also allowed to remain open — must prepare and post a “Social Distancing Protocol,” using this document as a template. As part of that plan, businesses must post signs at each public entrance “to inform all employees and customers that they should: avoid entering the facility if they have a cough or fever; maintain a minimum six-foot distance from one another; sneeze and cough into a cloth or tissue or, if not available, into one’s elbow; and not shake hands or engage in any unnecessary physical contact.”
Another new development is a per-person limit on “goods that are selling out quickly,” such as grocery store staples like beans. Stores are asked to place “per-person limits” on those items, with the goal of reducing crowds and lines. Stores must also “post an employee at the door to ensure that the maximum number of customers in the facility...is not exceeded.”
Finally, there are formal codifications of procedures most places are (one hopes) already following: For example, restaurants and grocery stores (as well as other businesses that might have lines) must now place “tape or other markings at least six feet apart in customer line areas inside the store and on sidewalks at public entrances with signs directing customers to use the markings to maintain distance.” And now it’s official: The new rules say that stores and restaurants may not allow “customers to bring their own bags, mugs, or other reusable items from home.”
Every restaurant, grocery store, and other Bay Area essential business must fill out and display this document is 11:59 p.m. on April 2, 2020, the order reads, and business owners must be ready and able to show “evidence of its implementation to any authority enforcing this Order upon demand,” which means that restaurants must prove to officials that even in tight quarters like kitchens, the six-foot rule is being officially observed.
Finally, don’t assume that you can grab some takeout and enjoy it during a nice, socially distant meal at a local park. As part of the new order, all “playgrounds, dog parks, public picnic areas, and similar recreational areas” have been closed to the public.
“What we need now, for the health of all our communities, is for people to stay home,” San Francisco Department of Public Health head Dr. Grant Colfax said via statement. “Even though it has been difficult, the Bay Area has really stepped up to the challenge so far, and we need to reaffirm our commitment. We need more time to flatten the curve, to prepare our hospitals for a surge, and to do everything we can to minimize the harm that the virus causes to our communities.”