BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) — It will be just a few more days for some New Yorkers before turning back to a sense of normalcy. New York PAUSE ends on Friday.
“We want to do it smartly, we want to do it,” said Governor Andrew Cuomo Monday.
That means portions of New York State can go back to work.
The state will be opening in four phases. Phase One, which will start Friday for some parts of the state will include construction, manufacturing, wholesale trade, select retail for curbside only, agriculture, forestry and fishing.
But, this will NOT include Western New York.
To open, a region needs to meet specific requirements. It must: see a 14 day decline in hospitalizations, 14 day decline in deaths, must have the number of hospitalizations as a whole go down, must have enough regular beds and ICU beds available, must have enough tests and enough contact tracers. So far, the Western New York region is not meeting the 14 day decline in hospitalizations and the 14 day decline in the number of deaths.
“The hospitalizations are out of our control,” said Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz. “What we can control is social distancing.”
From here, the state says businesses need to start coming up with re-opening plans. There should be social distancing guidelines in place as well as masks for all employees.
