Last week, “staff members of the Riverside County Registrar of Voters Office tested positive for coronavirus,” the county announced. Permanent and temporary staff were tested and dozens were required to quarantine. The office was cleaned and disinfected.
“It is key to our election process to ensure the Registrar of Voters employees are safe and healthy,” said Riverside County Registrar of Voters Rebecca Spencer. “I fully expect that we will be able to certify the election by Dec. 3 and today’s [Nov. 25] testing will help the office to meet the state’s deadline.”
Currently, Riverside County is in the purple tier of the state’s tier system. According to the state’s tier system, purple means the virus is widespread and that many nonessential indoor business operations are closed.
Congress still has not passed another stimulus package to assist small businesses and those who have suffered permanent job loss as we move into winter.
Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a $500 million COVID Relief Grant program, a $12.5-million increase to the California Rebuilding Fund and temporary tax relief that “entails an automatic three-month income tax extension for taxpayers filing less than $1 million in sales tax, extends the availability of existing interest and penalty-free payment agreements to companies with up to $5 million in taxable sales and provides expanded interest free payment options for larger businesses particularly affected by significant restrictions on operations based on COVID-19 transmissions.”
California has 4.1 million small businesses. The COVID Relief Grant program will distribute “grants of up to $25,000 to underserved micro and small businesses throughout the state by early 2021. Nonprofits would also be eligible for these grants.”
Visit https://business.ca.gov/, for information and updates.
“While we wait for Congress and the White House to approve an economic relief package that responds to the current surge, California has a chance to help nonprofits, small businesses and communities now,” said Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Lakewood).
“California is also strengthening its face covering guidance to require individuals to wear a mask whenever outside their home with limited exceptions,” a recent press release reads. Go to https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CID/DCDC/Pages/COVID-19/guidance-for-face-coverings.aspx, to read the updated guidance.
The state added 1,872 beds at alternate care sites outside of the hospital system in anticipation of a surge in cases.
According to the Riverside University Health System – Public Health (RUHS) website, the area of Idyllwild-Pine Cove has a total of 31 reported COVID-19 cases since the outbreak and one death reported. Twenty-five of the 31 people have recovered.
As of press time on Dec. 1, Riverside County has 84,412 confirmed COVID-19 cases. There are 1,442 deaths related to COVID-19 and 67,305 people have recovered. There are 585 individuals being hospitalized and of those 129 are in the intensive care unit (ICU). The county’s positivity rate is 9.9%. The current adjusted case rate per 100,000 is 27.2.
As of press time on Nov. 23, Riverside County had 78,442 confirmed COVID-19 cases. There were 1,400 deaths related to COVID-19 and 65,613 people had recovered. There were 375 individuals being hospitalized and of those 99 were in the ICU. The county’s positivity rate was 8.9%. The current adjusted case rate per 100,000 was 22.4.
As of press time on Nov. 17, Riverside County had 75,848 confirmed COVID-19 cases. There were 1,374 deaths related to COVID-19 and 64,922 people had recovered. There were 310 individuals being hospitalized and of those 78 were in the ICU. The county’s positivity rate was 6.7%. The current adjusted case rate per 100,000 was 13.9.
To date, 1,109,560 people have been tested for COVID-19 in Riverside County, according to RUHS. The two demographics with the highest number of cases are Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander and Hispanic/Latino.
