Cities extend local emergency declarations
BRAWLEY — The cities of El Centro and Brawley recently renewed their local emergency declarations in response to COVID-19.
During their respective regular meetings on Aug. 4, El Centro and Brawley councils unanimously approved to extending their emergency status until Oct. 3. El Centro originally adopted its emergency declaration on March 17, while Brawley did so two days later.
Per the policy of both resolutions, the cities must review the declarations within 60 days of their instatement. The cities last extended the proclamations in June.
The gist of those proclamations is that COVID-19 would cause each city to exceed its local available healthcare resources and that it would create demands beyond the control of its services, personnel, equipment and facilities.
A resolution is necessary to qualify California Office of Emergency Services (CalOES) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) funding.
“This resolution is very important to us, as this allows us to be able to be reimbursed for costs that are associated with COVID,” El Centro City Manager Marcela Piedra said during the Aug. 4 meeting.
The decision to reinstate the declarations come at a time when Imperial County is still in Phase 1 of its Roadmap to Recovery reopening plan, yet local COVID-19 patient statistics are declining.
As of Thursday, El Centro and Brawley are the second and third cities, respectively, in the county with the highest number of COVID cases (with Calexico being first). El Centro has had 2,621 total cases and 84 deaths, while Brawley has had 1,718 total cases and 30 deaths.
During his COVID update presentation in the Aug. 4 council meeting, Brawley Fire Department Chief Mike York reported Pioneers Memorial Hospital was using none of its surge capacity at the time to care for COVID patients.
He said the county’s seven-day positive test rate had lowered to 12.5 percent (it had climbed back to 13.46 percent as of Thursday). Per the state, the county cannot have more than an 8 percent positive testing rate over a seven-day period before it can apply to advance to Stage 2.
“We are trending downward, and we are very hopeful that that will continue,”
York said.
For El Centro, the city had initially adopted its resolution to include El Centro Regional Medical Center.
This was done in order to include the hospital in its funding request.
However, city officials reported at the Aug. 4 meeting that CalOES instructed the city and the hospital to provide separate resolutions from their respective governing bodies to ensure that reimbursement is provided separately and directly to each entity. Consequently, the council’s vote applied only to the city. The ECRMC board adopted a similar resolution on its own on July 27.
El Centro Fire Department Chief Ken Herbert told council members ECRMC’s hospitalization capacity is being less taxed.
“I don’t remember the last time I saw anything in a report that indicated more than one or two transfers out of the county,” Herbert said. “Things are stabilizing on that front.”
Herbert also said the city is working with county Public Health officials and discussing plans for moving forward.
“Even though we’re beginning to trend downward, this is definitely not the time to take a huge step backwards,” he said. “And certainly not the time to stop doing the very basics: Wearing the face cover, washing your hands and maintaining your physical distance.”