Colorado\u2019s stay-at-home health order expires Sunday<\/a>, when it will morph into what Gov. Jared Polis has called a less restrictive \u201csafer-at-home order.\u201d Pitkin County\u2019s stay-at-home public health order \u2014 which supersedes the state\u2019s \u2014 doesn\u2019t expire until Thursday.<\/p>\nThe Pitkin County Board of Health is scheduled to hold an emergency meeting Tuesday to determine the future of the county order, so the exact parameters of post-April 30 life remain hazy.<\/p>\n
But provided AVH can handle whatever happens because of this first easing of restrictions, the next change in the order in about two weeks would likely include increasing maximum group size from five to 10, looking at opening child care facilities with guidance from public health and developing a checklist for businesses, offices and other gathering places, Koenemann said.<\/p>\n
That checklist will include items such as symptom screening, frequent hand-washing and use of face masks, among other protocols, that is likely to be posted, used and adhered to until a vaccine is discovered, she said. Most estimates say a vaccine is 12 to 18 months down the road.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is for the long game,\u201d Koenemann said. \u201c(The checklist) is gonna be there for a while.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s unclear how the checklist would pertain to customers at businesses, offices or, eventually, restaurants, she said.<\/p>\n
Provided health care impacts in the upper Roaring Fork Valley remain manageable throughout those first two phases easing restrictions, officials might begin to consider opening restaurants and bars in Aspen and Pitkin County during the third phase, Koenemann said.<\/p>\n
If the precedent of waiting 14 days for the impact of each phase to become clear is adhered to, that would put restaurant consideration around June 1.<\/p>\n
The specifics of what a COVID-19-impacted restaurant might look like remain unclear, though there will be limitations, she said. That will at least include removing some tables, having a chair between patrons seated at bars and other seating restrictions, Koenemann said.<\/p>\n
Beyond that, Koenemann said she hasn\u2019t received guidance yet on virus-related restaurant protocols and whether they might include temperature checks for guests at the door as California Gov. Gavin Newsom has suggested.<\/p>\n
Gyms will probably fall into the same category and timeframe as restaurants, Koenemann said.<\/p>\n
Another major consideration is lodging.<\/p>\n
Pitkin County Commissioner Greg Poschman hit the nail on the head when he noted in a Board of Health meeting a week ago that once officials allow hotels, lodges and short-term rentals to resume, \u201cit means we\u2019re open for business.\u201d<\/p>\n
Koenemann said an influx of visitors from all over the country and the world is bound to increase spread of the virus. She also said that mountain counties with rural, resort communities, including Eagle, Gunnison and others, have agreed in principle to restrict lodging longer than more populated areas.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy recommendation to the Board of Health is that we continue to restrict lodging for a bit longer than (cities),\u201d Koenemann said.<\/p>\n
Once lodging is allowed to reopen, she said it would be reasonable to assume restrictions like a maximum of 50% occupancy.<\/p>\n
Also, while some Colorado counties have reserved recreational areas inside those counties, including U.S. Forest Service land, solely for county residents, Pitkin County has no plans to do so.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere should not be visitors here anyway,\u201d Koenemann said.<\/p>\n
Both Polis\u2019 safer-at-home order and Pitkin County\u2019s stay-at-home order envision citizens remaining at home or within a few miles of home to recreate, said Bill Linn, spokesman for the team managing the local virus outbreak.<\/p>\n
Finally there\u2019s the question of large cultural, musical or athletic events that are a staple of summer in Aspen.<\/p>\n
Once the Board of Health allows groups of 10 to congregate, officials will wait four-to-eight weeks, analyze virus-related data and next increase group size to between 25 and 50, she said. The plan would be to wait another four-to-eight weeks after that, again look at the data and increase group size to 250 at that point if the situation merits, she said.<\/p>\n
Koenemann, Muething and other public officials have praised Aspen and Pitkin County residents for adhering to the restrictive health orders that allowed them to get a handle on COVID-19 in the upper Roaring Fork Valley. Residents\u2019 high level of cooperation was verified by cellphone data gathered by Google, officials have said.<\/p>\n
The first easing of restrictions is the beginning of a long road, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are a couple lights in the tunnel,\u201d Koenemann said during a COVID-19 community meeting last week outlining the lesser restrictions and new strategy. \u201cWe can\u2019t predict the light at the end (yet).\u201d<\/p>\n
jauslander@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\nvia:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Though local and state officials are starting to unwind the restrictive public health orders that have kept most Colorado residents at home for more than a month, they also have made clear that life won\u2019t return to normal until scientists invent a vaccine for the coronavirus. With that milestone unlikely for perhaps as long as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2457661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-17 23:25:23","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2457661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2457661"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2457661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2457668,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2457661\/revisions\/2457668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2457661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2457661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2457661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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