Businesses look to rebound as virus restrictions ease once again

Outdoor dining returned to the Strawberry Village Shopping Center and the rest of California last week after the state ended the hospitalization-based stay-home order and assigned most counties, including Marin, to the purple tier for widespread transmission of the coronavirus — which is still the most restrictive of the four-tier framework to resume business and social activities. (Elliot Karlan photo / For The Ark)

Tiburon Peninsula business owners can once again expand operations after the state and county ended its most recent stay-at-home orders last week — and while many said they welcomed the chance at increased business, they also noted they planned to proceed cautiously as the pandemic drags on.

California on Jan. 26 lifted its mandatory stay-at-home order, which was based on intensive-care-unit bed availability and had locked down four of the five state-defined regions since December. State public-health officials cited the slowing spread of COVID-19 across California and projections that regional ICU availability would return to or remain above the 15-percent threshold that triggered the lockdowns.

Marin joined most California counties in being immediately assigned to the most-restrictive purple tier of the state’s color-coded blueprint for reopening, which is based on local case rates and test positivity.

Marin Health and Human Services swiftly announced that all purple-tier eligible activities could resume, paving the way for hair salons, barbershops, nail salons and massage studios to once again operate indoors; for hotels, motels and other-short term lodging to reopen to the general public; and for libraries, retail stores and malls to open at 25 percent capacity.

Restaurants, places of worship, gyms and farmers markets were among the businesses allowed to resume outdoor operations.

Local businesses have navigated a series of changing restrictions since last March, as rules have tightened during virus surges and then loosened as case rates start to level off.

“This is our new normal,” said Tiburon Peninsula Chamber of Commerce Executive Director DeAnn Biss. “We’re all trying to navigate, and our businesses are being very responsive to the conditions.”

Paulino Monterroso, owner of Salt & Pepper restaurant on Main Street, said the restaurant had planned to resume outdoor dining last week but delayed because of several days of rain.

“Now what I’m wishing for is good weather,” he said.

Via Piccola Trattoria at The Cove Shopping Center reopened for outdoor dining Jan. 29, coinciding with a forecasted dry weekend. Owner Pedro Ulloa said he hoped the sunshine would entice people to eat outdoors.

Rustic Bakery founder and co-owner Carol LeValley said she was happy “the pandemic trend is going the other direction now and that some of the restrictions are being lifted.”

She said Rustic Bakery will offer limited outdoor seating in a capacity they can safely manage, but they continue to offer takeout and delivery.

“The health and safety of our customers and employees remains our most important concern,” LeValley said.

Natale Servino, who runs Servino Ristorante and Caffe Acri on Main Street, noted the most recent closure was particularly difficult because it came after an extended period of loosened restrictions and good weather.

“We had good momentum coming out of the summer months and a warm fall,” Servino said. “The customer base seemed to get behind eating outdoors, and almost all of our staff that wanted to come back to work were able to return.”

The abrupt closures in December were just another challenge the restaurants were forced to overcome, he said.

“We will try and pick things up where we left off,” he said. “Our front of house staff is ready to come back … and hopefully we can at least keep outdoor dining open from here on out.”

Meanwhile, Pizza Antica in the Strawberry Village Shopping Center was preparing to once again welcome customers back for outdoor dining.

“Today, we’re doing open air, and we’ll have the tent system up tonight,” General Manager Kassra Azimi said in a Jan. 29 interview. “We’ve been getting calls all week to ask if we’re doing outdoor dining. It’s pretty exciting. The staff is all prepared. They’re looking forward to it.”

Other local businesses were eager to reopen or expand operations. Lisa Lori, owner of Main Street clothing and accessories boutique The Perfect Provenance, said she had purchased a new air-purifying system to further clean the air beyond the existing HVAC systems “for everyone’s safety.”

Hair salon owner Cindy Siciliano, whose studio is at the Maritime Plaza, reopened for indoor service Jan. 26 and said she booked the day solid. By that afternoon, she had already cut the shaggy locks of nine customers.

“I have four more before the end of the day,” she said.

Thao Thi of the family-owned Era Salon in Strawberry was happy to reopen the salon for full-service amenities. During the last shutdown, they were able to give pedicures outdoors, but the cold weather prevented that during the latest closures. Thi said some of their customers are seniors who can’t cut their own toenails and come to them just for that.

Servino, who also serves as president of the Chamber of Commerce, noted the cycle of tightening and loosening restrictions has been tough on the local business community and noted the pandemic has not yet ended.

“We will need to rely heavily on the support of each other, and our local community, to get through these next two to three months,” he said. “I am confident that the future is bright for commerce in Tiburon, but right now we are needing to take things one day at a time.”

New challenges ahead

Progress toward easing more restrictions locally under the state’s blueprint to reopen the economy will continue to rely on per-capita infection rates and test-positivity percentages, both for the general population and for vulnerable populations under health-equity requirements.

Marin’s adjusted seven-day new-case rate was 16.8 per 100,000, more than double the maximum rate of seven per 100,000 to qualify for red tier-2 status for substantial transmission, which would allow more sectors and activities to resume. The county’s seven-day test-positivity rate of 4.4 percent would, taken alone, qualify the county for the red tier, as would its 7.8-percent test-positivity rate among vulnerable populations.

Bringing down those numbers will depend, in part, on local and regional vaccination efforts and education, with experts suggesting some 70 to 85 percent of the population may need to be vaccinated to achieve herd immunity.

However, a California Health Care Foundation poll released last week showed just 71 percent of residents said they definitely or probably would get vaccinated.

In addition to general reluctance, officials are also battling supply shortages and concerns about the efficacy of vaccines against several emerging variants.

Marin officials said Jan. 29 that across all major health-care providers combined — including Marin’s Department of Public Health, MarinHealth, Kaiser Permanente and Sutter Health — fewer than 500 doses per day are available this week. Marin Public Health Officer Dr. Matt Willis said the county wanted to vaccinate as many as 2,000 people age 75 and older per day for a month to get both doses to the 25,000-30,000 residents in that age group.

While the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require at second dose at three and four weeks, respectively, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Jan. 21 that the second dose can be administered up to six weeks later if supply shortages continue and regions need to prioritize first doses. Marin officials said the practice is being considered but has not been adopted at the state or local levels.

To date, about 10 percent of county residents have received at least their first dose of the vaccine and 2 percent have received both.

Meanwhile, new data show the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines offer protection against two highly contagious new strains of the virus initially found in the U.K. and South Africa — though they’re six times less effective against the latter variant.

Moderna has said it will test booster doses, including one engineered to fight the variants.

California’s own variant, originally found in the Bay Area and suspected in the surge of cases in Los Angeles, is still under study.

With the new variants found, many health experts are now recommending the use of face coverings at all times outside the home, with a focus on using medical-grade N95 respirators — or the Chinese-spec KN95 — or by double masking with both a surgical mask and a cloth covering.

Properly fitted N95 respirators and surgical masks are intended to help protect the wearer from airborne particles and liquids contaminating the mouth and nose. However, cloth face coverings are only intended to help protect others, by trapping larger exhaled droplets inside the mask before they become airborne.

Health officials still recommend any extra precaution be taken alongside other existing safety measures, including physical distancing and frequent hand washing.

Executive Editor Kevin Hessel contributed to this report. Deirdre McCrohan has reported on Tiburon local government and community issues for more than 30 years. Reach her at 415-944-4634.