IT’S OFFICIAL: SONOMA COUNTY MOVES TO RED TIER ON SUNDAY

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After months mired in the purple tier, Sonoma County will officially advance into the less restrictive red coronavirus tier this weekend.

The change will come at 12:01 a.m. Sunday. At that time, indoor dining, entertainment and exercising will resume across Sonoma County with capacity limits. Restaurants and brewpubs that serve food will be able to operate indoor dining with 25% capacity up to a max of 100 people. Retail establishments are allowed to increase their capacity to 50%, and movie theaters can reopen at 25% capacity up to a maximum of 100 people. Meantime, museums and zoos will be limited to 25% capacity, and gyms to 10% capacity.

Also, under the new rules breweries wineries and distilleries that don’t serve food can operate outdoors only with certain protocols required. Bars that don’t also serve food will still remain closed.

The red tier also allows all K-12 schools to reopen, but only after they have had their COVID-19 safety plans posted to their website for 5 days prior to reopening.

The changes come as California today passed the threshold of 2 million vaccinations performed among the state’s 8 million poorest community members. Under a newly modified tier system, that allowed counties with under 10 cases per 100,000 population per day to reopen. The previous threshold had been 7 cases per day per 100,000. Sonoma County’s most recent case rate was 8.7, with an adjusted figure of 7.8 (based upon local testing).

As Sonoma County’s case rate and positivity figures continue to come down, county health officials say they anticipate progressing further into the orange tier, hopefully in the next few weeks.