Outdoor Dining In Manhattan Beach Going, Going, Gone In 3-2 Vote
MANHATTAN BEACH, CA — Restaurants in Manhattan Beach and Los Angeles County will have to temporarily close to outdoor dining for three weeks starting tomorrow [Wednesday, Nov. 25] at 10 p.m. after the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 to uphold the ban, which was announced Sunday.
County Supervisors had previously voted unanimously to implement staggered safeguards designed to protect against the spread of COVID-19 during a meeting last week. At the time, Dr. Barbara Ferrer, LA County public health director, delivered a presentation and the supervisors agreed 5-0 on the implementation protocols once specific positive COVID-19 test numbers were hit. The number 4,000 triggered the outdoor dining ban Dr. Ferrer announced Sunday during a COVID-19 news briefing after the five-day caseload of COVID-19 averaged more than 4,000 cases.
During today's Supervisors' meeting, Supervisor Janice Hahn expressed concern that the outdoor dining ban had not been publicly discussed prior to its announcement Sunday to the public as a measure that was going to be implemented. She told fellow Supervisors during today's meeting she had not expected the county to hit the 4,000 mark as quickly as it did.
She called the new numbers being hit "jarring" and that she understands the "inclination to shut things down." From there, she took a deeper dive into the data pushing the ban on outdoor dining into place and whether or not positive cases could be linked to outdoor dining.
“I have never experienced the type of pushback that I am hearing,” said Hahn. "I have heard from chambers of commerce, restaurant owners, associations and friends. The public doesn’t think that recommendation is right and they don’t think it’s going to work and they are really losing faith and trust in the decisions that we’re making.”
Dr. Ferrer noted that increased case numbers are a predictor of more future hospitalizations. Earlier, Dr. Christina Ghaly, county health services director, told the supervisors that it isn't the number of beds or rooms needed for an increase in COVID-19 patients but rather an increase in staff. She explained that with COVID-19 cases surging nationwide, medical professionals from other parts of the country aren't available to travel to LA County hospitals to provide assistance. She also said doctors and nurses and other medical staff are also having to quarantine for 14 days once they've been exposed to the coronavirus, another limiting factor on hospital staffing.
Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who also chairs the board, publicly stated her opposition to the outdoor dining ban yesterday. Hahn joined her for the two dissenting votes on the outdoor dining ban. Supervisors Mark Ridley-Thomas, Hilda Solis and Sheila Kuehl voted to keep the ban in place.
Hahn mentioned the lack of Federal funding as a problem, saying she wished the county had money to allow people to stay home and that "without clear data [the county is using CDC data to shutter restaurants]" she preferred to "land on the side of people keeping their jobs."
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This article originally appeared on the Manhattan Beach Patch
