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Santa Barbara County could be heading to Orange Tier of reopening

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Santa Barbara County Public Health Department

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Santa Barbara County has met the criteria to move into the Orange Tier of reopening for one week. Santa Barbara County Public Health officials state, if the county’s case rate and positivity rate remain the same or get better the county could reopen to the Orange Tier.

In a statement, public health officials wrote “The County can move into the Orange Tier of the Blueprint for a Safer Economy when its case rate has been under 6 cases per every 100,000 residents and test positivity is under 4.9% for the last two weeks.”

Tuesday health officials stated the county has a case rate of 4.6 cases per 100,000 residents and a local test positivity rate of 1.9%. 

Public health officials added these are activities which will be allowed with Santa Barbara County’s anticipated move to the Orange Tier include:

 • Restaurants: Indoor seating increases to 50% capacity or 200 people maximum

 • Gyms and Fitness Centers: 25% capacity indoors; indoor pools can open

 • Wineries and Breweries: 25% or 100 people indoors maximum

 • Movie Theaters: 50% or 200 people maximum

 • Museums, Zoos and Aquariums: 50% capacity for indoor activities

 • Places of Worship: 50% capacity indoor activities

 • Bars with no food service: Open outdoors with modifications

 • All retail: No capacity limits

After Easter weekend, Santa Barbara County did see an increase in cases. March’s highest single new case day was March 4, 72 new cases. April has already surpassed that twice, April 9, 119 new cases and April 10, 110 new cases. Since April 11 the county has an average of 28.3 new cases per day.

In an interview Santa Barbara County Public Health officer, Dr. Henning Ansorg, said, those high numbers are the result of delayed data. And many of those counted on April 9 and April 10 were cases from January.

In the last 14 days, Santa Barbara County has reported an average of 43.9 new cases per day. However, many of those are from uncounted cases. Tuesday there were 11 new cases and there are 143 active cases in the county. Most of the recent upticks were in Lompoc and Santa Maria. While Santa Barbara has the most active cases.

Both Santa Barbara County Public Health and Cottage Health have COVID-19 vaccine appointments available. Visit their websites or MyTurn to make an appointment.

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Scott Sheahen

Scott Sheahen is a reporter for NewsChannel 3-12. To learn more about Scott, click here.

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