Administrative reports with no specific fiscal impact.

The Health Services Department has established a website dedicated to COVID-19, including daily updates. The site is located at: https://www.coronavirus.cchealth.org/  

Written commentary was provided by (attached): Victor Rameriz; Alvaro Gomez; Bernardino Juarez; Bianca Retano; Cristina Lorenzana; Dajenya Shoshanna Kafele; Edith Pastrano; Eric Sanchez; Erika Pantoja; Eulalia Galvan; Glenda; Ina Mason; Jacqueline Chavez; Juana Rangel; Kathy Greene; Lucia Roan; Maria Esther Sanchez; Maria Ines Davalos; Maria Tapia; Pam Stello; Rosa Flores; Rosa Vargas; Sharon Greenblum; Bakari Kafele; Douglas A. Leich; Andres Soto; Mariana Moore; Jane Courant; Allison Becwar; Susanna Marshland; Pete Bennett; David Sharples; Jessica Jollett; Dan Geiger; Nancy Ybarra; Ana Gozalez.

Sheriff's Report

The majority of the County’s 750 sworn officers and support staff are working and ready to deploy wherever needed. In the jails all employees and inmates are screened upon entry to the facility. Temperatures are being taken and inquiries made about medical history. All new arrestees are placed in a 14 day quarantine. There are presently 38 inmates in the quarantine module. The staff are following the directives of the Health Officer and CDC. PPE has been issued to all staff, all inmates have received masks. Most inmates have chosen to wear the masks when out of cell. Soap and water is provided and all staff wear PPE when interacting with inmates. A deep cleaning of the facilities has been completed. 

One deputy has tested positive from the virus. He has recovered and doing well. Twenty-two  inmates have been tested and none are positive. Visits have been suspended except for attorneys on an urgency basis; time for inmate access to phones to call loved ones and friends has been increased and the rate charged has been lowered; chaplains have been issued special phones that inmates can call directly; postage cost has been waived for outgoing mail.

The jail has the capacity for approximately 2000 inmates. There are currently 722 in custody systemwide (36% of capacity). 466 are out of the facilities, on a custody alternative system, such as ankle monitoring or home monitoring. In 30 days the population has been reduced from 1117 inmates down to 722.

Bookings have been limited now to serious or violent felonies as police chiefs and other organizations are aggressively seeking alternatives to incarceration. Field citations are being issued to restrict the population coming into the central Martinez Detention Facility. The state prison system has stopped accepting transfers of those convicted of serious or violent felony. Those 24 individuals will remain in Contra Costa custody. 89% of offenders are now in single cells to help with protection against the virus and that number is expected to increase.

A cautious approach is being used in the matter of early releases. Only after the benefit of a full criminal history study of each person is presented for review are releases implemented. To date 39 persons have been released, those with a very low likelihood of re-offending. Because of the severity of their offenses, some offenders will simply not be eligible for consideration.

In regard to the statewide zero bail order, the Sheriff’s Department strenuously objects to requiring zero bail for offenses including vehicular manslaughter, unlawful sex with a minor, numerous weapons charges and arson. The department is working on engaging with the state and Chief Justice’s office to see about modifications to the order.

The Sheriff reported that most crime categories have seen a reduction in both the unincorporated area and the cities, with a very slight uptick in domestic violence cases.  

Health Services Report

As of April 13^th, there are 552 confirmed cases of Covid-19:  36 hospitalized, 16 of those in intensive care, and 12 deaths. There are 40 suspected cases awaiting test results, of which seven are in the ICU. Ms. Roth expressed great appreciation for the region’s health care providers and safety net providers thoughtful and coordinated approach, functioning as one system to address the needs of the community, a key part of preparing for the surge.

Congregate living and care facilities are being closely monitored. Ms. Roth reminded that this is a novel virus with no vaccine and no known treatment. The primary strategy at this time is to disrupt transmission of the illness through social distancing and sanitation which appears to be effective. Staff is actively searching all avenues to acquire more PPE.

Dr. Farnitano said they have been responding to outbreaks, investigating potential outbreaks, and preventing outbreaks. The public health teams have been working in close partnership with many of the private hospital systems, especially John Muir and Kaiser Permanente to address outbreaks in nursing homes and elder care facilities. Training and PPE are  being provided to those facilities as well as working individually with facilities on infection control plans. All staff and visitors are required to wear a mask and undergo temperature checks.  Public Health is also working closely with the detention facilities to prevent any outbreaks there. 

To date Health Services has successfully moved two of the three largest adult homeless shelter populations into hotel rooms, to have the third largest (Richmond rescue mission) moved tomorrow, and continue to address the other shelters and homeless encampments. Hand washing stations and portable toilets have been deployed to encampments in Antioch and Richmond. Healthcare for the homeless teams are regularly monitoring and visiting sites, seeking to arrange testing for any sick persons. A priority testing location is being run 7 days a week for high risk populations and related staff. The results are available within 24 hours or less allowing for aggressive and early action to prevent spread.

Work continues to prepare for a surge, including acquiring more ventilators, setting up Covid-19 dedicated patient wards and additional staff capacity. Facilities are in operation at the Craneway Center and the Antioch Fairgrounds. The Concord shelter has a medical unit on site and may become a Covid facility if needed.

The  Emergency Operations Center has acquired more PPE that was not available from the normal vendors and is being distributed to the hospitals, first responders and care facilities in need.

The Coronavirus hot line in open seven days a week at 1-844-729-8410 and information is available at 211 and 211.org.

County Administrator on Budget and Labor Relations   When the shelter at home order began in March the County addressed the concern of how to assist employees with managing illness, the event of illness of family member, and the sudden need to care for school age children with no daycare and no school.   The County goal was to provide wage and benefit support for the employees. Therefore the County granted 64 hours of sick leave to employees to manage issues related to Covid-19.  At the federal level the Families First Act was adopted, requiring 80 hours of sick leave be provided to employees, with some exceptions.  The County chose to grant the benefit to all employees. These actions have been ratified by the Board.

In March, the Board had authorized an advance on April funding from the Community Based Organizations (CBO) for the contract services they provide for the county in the amount of approximately $11 million.  The County has received a request from the CBO’s for additional assistance for the remaining months of this fiscal year.  The County Administrator’s office will be reviewing what help can be provided.    The Federal government recently passed the CARE Act to provide financial assistance for counties and cities with a population greater than 500 thousand. The Board has approved the application and that was submitted and accepted this morning.  It is formula based, so the county estimates that it will receive around $190 million.  This seems to be lot of money, however we have already spent about $100 million so far and expect by June that the expenses combined with losses of revenue to be nearly $200 million.  The CARE Act has specific prohibition provisions:  1. It cannot be used for any base wage items 2. It cannot be used to backfill loss of revenue.  So, none of the dollars expended for employees who were unable to work nor the loss of revenue such as sales taxes is reimbursable under this Act.  The combined loss of revenue from sales tax and the closure of clinics is estimated to be $100 million by the end of June, the end of the fiscal year.   There will be very little left of the CARE Act dollars at the end of the fiscal year.   For the next budget year, there are significant impacts to the economy.  The state and federal governments are facing significant downturns in revenue.  It is from those revenues, such as motor vehicle licensing fees and sales taxes, that the County receives realignment revenues (money provided to cover programs transferred from state responsibility to the County such as inmate housing).  For just the remaining 4 months of this fiscal year, the County estimates a loss of around $20.7 million.  The state legislature will be meeting in the next week to discuss these issues, but it is not expected that as the state addresses it’s own revenue losses, they will be able to wholly cover the impacts to counties.