Which Bay Area Counties Will Reopen Indoor Dining Next?

Welcome to p.m. Intel, your bite-sized roundup of Bay Area food and restaurant news. Tips are always welcome, drop them here.

• As of publication time, Bay Area diners can take a seat indoors in Marin, Napa, San Mateo, Santa Clara, and San Francisco counties; the rest of the region remains open for outdoor or takeout service only. (You can see our full county-by-county dining guide here.) Berkeleyside reports that if COVID-19 cases continue to drop, Alameda County will be eligible to reopen indoor dining as soon as Wednesday, March 10, which means that diners in cities like Berkeley and Oakland could move inside next week. Further east, Contra Costa County officials tell KRON 4 that they hope to reopen indoor service “within two or three weeks,” if case rates stay low. Officials in Sonoma County are less specific about a reopening target, the Press-Democrat reports, saying only that they are “getting very close” to virus counts that would allow indoor dining to resume. Finally, San Mateo County officials say they expect to move to an even looser reopening tier on March 16, NBC Bay Area reports, one that would allow dining rooms to operate at 50 percent capacity instead of the 25 percent they’re restricted to now.
• SF-based grocery delivery company Instacart might not do a traditional IPO after all, and is instead might go public via a direct listing. [Reuters]
• The Alameda County Fair is planning a takeout/outdoor dining version of their midway food offerings, with treats from a multitude of local vendors. [East Bay Times]
• Fine dining restaurants are trying to figure out how to deliver the level of service diners expect, while working with a fraction of their usual staff. [Berkeleyside]
• Redwood City frozen yogurt shop Corner Yogurt was held up at gunpoint Wednesday night, and the female suspect remains at large. [Bay Area News Group]