News from CalChamber

Sacramento, CA: Governor Gavin Newsom issued new restrictions yesterday, calling on everyone over the age of 65 and those with chronic health conditions to isolate at home, effective immediately. In addition, he called for the closure of bars, wineries, night clubs and brew pubs, and asked restaurants to reduce occupancy by half.

By isolating and socially distancing population cohorts, he said, we can protect those most vulnerable to the virus while ensuring the needs of the population are met.

“We need a productive society. I’m not willing to submit that in this moment we can’t have cohorts of society being productive, just in a radically different way. And so if you’re young and healthy…you will work through this quite well [so] that we still can be productive to the extent we feel like we have the capacity to deliver for 40 million people their meals, their basic necessities. We may then make additional adjustments, but for the moment we feel this is an appropriate adjustment,” Governor Newsom said.

Allan Zaremberg, president and CEO of the California Chamber of Commerce, responded to the Governor’s announcement yesterday by issuing the following statement:

“The California Chamber of Commerce applauds the Governor for his efforts in doing everything possible to protect the health and safety of Californians while balancing the need to keep the state’s economy open for business.

“The government safety net for vulnerable populations and the workers displaced by a lack of economic activity is funded by the private sector economy through tax revenue as well as by providing the jobs that give workers wages and benefits so they can provide for their families.

“CalChamber strongly agrees with the Governor that those Californians who can be productive must be productive to provide the goods and services we all need.”

Resources Available

Governor Newsom also unveiled additional state resources:

• An online portal page that will help people with mild flu-like symptoms determine whether they may have COVID-19 and direct those people to available testing centers;
• Increased lab testing capacity and the opening of new labs by Quest Diagnostics.

A resources page compiling important coronavirus, COVID-19, news and updates is available at calchamber.com/coronavirus.