Reopening to begin ‘soon’
DeSantis doesn’t give time frame for South Florida
Citing positive coronavirus trends in Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Wednesday the region likely would start Phase 1 of reopening “soon,” but he didn’t offer a timetable.
“There’s been good trends; there’s been a lot of great work in all three of these counties,” he said at a news conference at the drivethru coronavirus testing site at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens. “We’ll hopefully be able to go forward soon in southern Florida.”
The state’s other 64 counties began Phase 1 reopening on Monday, which DeSantis acknowledged is not as widespread as many would like. Restaurants and retail establishments are limited to 25% capacity and many businesses such as bars, barber shops, hair salons and gyms aren’t open.
Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties had been coordinating their reopening plans to ensure that one county doesn’t
get overwhelmed with visitors from another.
The Palm Beach County commission decided Tuesday to ask the governor for permission to join the rest of the state in a partial reopening from coronavirus restrictions. Commissioners also agreed to have a special meeting Friday to discuss opening the county’s beaches.
South Florida wasn’t included in Phase 1, DeSantis said, because the rates of cases and deaths in Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties are much higher than the overall numbers for Florida.
The 22,404 cases the Department of Public Health reported Wednesday in the three counties are 59% of all the cases in the state. The 866 deaths are 56% of the Florida total. The region is home to 29% of the state’s population.
DeSantis said the entire state, including the three South Florida counties, met “gating” recommendations from the White House coronavirus working group,
which suggests various thresholds for certain stages of reopening.
The governor said he would be “in discussions” with South Florida officials about when the region can enter Phase 1.
“We want to be safe about it. We want to be smart about it, and it is going to be a step-by-step process. It’s not just flipping a switch. But I do believe for Florida to be successful we need our southern Florida communities to be successful,” he said.
Broward officials said later they want to get the county open as soon, and safely as possible. But Dale Holness, the county mayor, and Dean Trantalis, mayor of Fort Lauderdale, which is the county’s most populous city, said local officials have been told the county doesn’t meet all the socalled “gating” criteria for reopening.
Holness and Trantalis said Paul Thaqi, director of the Florida Department of Health operation in Broward, told county mayors in in a Tuesday afternoon conference call that South Florida has met only four out of five standards for a Phase 1 reopening.
“We feel we’ve more than adequately satisfied the needs for reopening,” Trantalis said.
Both mayors said Thaqi told them the county can’t enter Phase 1 until antibody testing is more widely available. That standard is required of South Florida counties, and not the rest of the Florida because the region has a much higher rate of coronavirus cases and deaths.
On Wednesday, DeSantis announced the beginning of antibody testing in Florida. For now, antibody testing is reserved for health care workers and first responders.
Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who appeared at the stadium news conference with DeSantis, said the objective is to “open up as fast as we can,” something he wants “as quickly as possible.”
But, Gimenez said, anyone who is saying they plan to reopen on a particular date is incorrect. “There is no date,” he said.
Holness said Broward mayors are dismayed that some officials in Palm Beach County want to break away from the unified three-county coronavirus efforts.
“The sensible thing is for us to move together as a region,” Holness said. “The one thing we don’t want to do is open too early without using the proper science and data and then have a spur in new occurrences of the coronavirus and then have to shut down again.”
DeSantis said a balance must be struck between protecting health and restarting the economy. “There’s sometimes people out there saying either force everyone to stay in the house infinitum or do nothing, and that’s ridiculous. Obviously we’re still going to be fighting really hard. I think we also have to look at the data, look at the facts.”
He also suggested that some of the businesses elsewhere in the state that have been closed might soon be able to reopen. “If somebody is able to conduct their business in a way that’s low risk, government shouldn’t be restricting them.”
Holness said Broward leaders are considering how to go about reopening certain businesses such as restaurants, barber shops, beauty and nail salons — and the drive-in movie theater at the Swap Shop in Sunrise.
Most restaurants in the county say that in order to break even, they’d have to reopen at 50% capacity, Holness said. They would also need some lead time to ramp back up and get employees in place, he said. Some restaurants also want to use the extra 50% of parking space for outside seating, he said.
Limited steps taken so far by the three South Florida counties — reopening parks, golf courses, boat ramps and community pools — will have a minimal effect on spreading the virus, in part because people are self-policing, Holness said. They’re calling in to report when customers don’t use face masks or businesses don’t require it, and when people aren’t social distancing in public spaces, he said.