Area leaders provide local update on reopening, moving forward

County leaders met Friday to update the community on developments with COVID-19 and to address local questions regarding local and state initiatives. Information was shared regarding the reopening of businesses within the community and how the city and county will be following the governor’s directives as their local orders expire.

Joining the meeting were GRMC CEO Shane Kernell, Young County Local Health Authority Dr. Martin, Graham Mayor Neal Blanton, Young County Judge John Bullock and Graham City Manager Brandon Anderson. Blanton said this meeting of leaders will be the last public meeting unless more information becomes available which needs to be shared with the community.

“Our goal is to get you as much information as we can,” he said. “We don’t want to continue to do this if there is not information that is pertinent to the virus and what is going on in the community, so if something changes between now and next week we will continue to have this, but as of right now we will probably not have our meeting next Friday unless something new does come up and that we need to get that information out to y’all. I appreciate very much the effort that all of y’all have made. I continue to emphasize the point of social distancing. If you are 65 and over, a vulnerable age group, please think about staying home unless you absolutely need to get out and let’s continue to keep those cases down as low as we can.”

Bullock updated the community that as of late Thursday the county was authorized by the state to open certain businesses which were nonessential to 50% occupancy levels. He said as his order expires he will be following the governor’s directives.

“It’s got no orders or no directives in it other than acknowledging GA-18 and we need to follow those rules and regulations with regards to the reopening of our county,” he said. “Other than that it’s just the declaration and the reason that I reissued that is because it covered the whole county and once the city drop their declaration then it would cover them in case of any funding or anything like that that would come subsequent to that.”

Medical update

Dr. Martin updated the community and said there are no active cases within the county, which he added was classified as a low-risk area because it has only had four cases. He gave an update on the one positive case from out of the county that was announced Tuesday, April 28.

“We had one positive test this week,” Martin said. “This was an individual that lives in the metroplex, but grew up in Young County (and) came home to see their primary care team at Olney and was appropriately diagnosed. They did, after their diagnosis, return to the metroplex where they are quarantining. All contacts have been quarantined. Really, they had very limited exposure in Young County.”

He added that all of the three out-of-county cases had a connection in this county which brought them to the county in the first place.

Martin said for businesses to be aware of the fact that more active positive cases could potentially send businesses which are open at 50% capacity to 25% capacity.

“How we get to continue doing business and being open will depend on what kind of numbers we have going forward,” he said. “We are going to continue to test aggressively for our respiratory symptoms and within a week we will have the capability of doing the antibody test on anybody that wants it and so that will really help also because there are probably people who have had this that we don’t know about and if we can know how many those are that can help us decide how many people are already immune to it.”

Kernell updated the community on the status of GRMC and said things are moving back to normal, but in small steps.

“We start back elective surgeries on Monday with a full slate on our schedule, so that’s encouraging,” Kernell said. “We started elective imaging last week and the same thing with that one. I believe we have caught up on our backlog of scheduled imaging. We are working our way through our scheduled surgeries. That will take probably a good month to get through, but that is encouraging.”

GRMC, throughout the pandemic, has had a visitor policy and will continue to maintain this policy as of now, Kernell said.

“We still maintain the visitor policy of one essential visitor per patient and we do screen all visitors at the door when you come to the hospital. All employees have to wear masks when they are in the hospital as well as have their temperature taken once a day when they get to work so that will continue,” he said. “We maintain a state of readiness at the hospital in case there is a sudden influx to maintain at least 50% vent capacity which we are well over that number. But to date, we have had no patients in the hospital due to COVID-19 in Graham, Texas at our hospital, so that is good news as well.”

Business update

Young County Courthouse and Graham City Hall were set to open on Monday, May 4 as Anderson said the entities will continue to monitor the governor’s strike force and the efforts they have made in opening the Texas economy.

“Obviously, essential retail has been opened throughout, but this is the nonessential businesses, you are welcome to go back to work and open up within the guidelines, the 50% restriction,” Anderson said. “Continue to social distance, continue to keep hygiene paramount in your thoughts as you open.”

He said businesses and individuals are welcome to continue following social distancing by staying home.

“As we are, you know, out and about and starting to pick up and get back to normalcy, I would also tell you that it is certainly within your rights and if you continue to want to stay home and do shelter at home on your own that’s your choice as well,” Anderson said. “Same with businesses. Businesses are not required to open. They have the ability to reopen through the governor’s orders.”

Hair salons, gyms and barbershops are something Anderson said he hopes are clarified in the Monday, May 18 public hearing with Gov. Greg Abbott. He added right now that those businesses should adhere to the orders of the governor and stay closed.

“Those are businesses that are struggling. We know you guys have been closed for six weeks,” Anderson said. “The issue that comes into place is, and we’ve talked about it with our committee, we know that you are responsible business owners and we know that you could open up under the same guidelines (...). The issue comes with the licensing that you have through the state of Texas and I know there have been a few counties who have bucked this and gotten quick response from TDLR in terms of, ‘We hold your licensing, you need to follow the governor’s orders.’”