NEW YORK (1010 WINS) – Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he’d have a plan for New York City restaurants, which are still closed for indoor dining, by the end of the week as he announced most orange and yellow zones were being lifted statewide amid improving coronavirus numbers.
Cuomo said the state would be talking with Mayor Bill de Blasio, health officials, elected officials, the restaurant community and other stakeholders in the city this week.
“And by the end of the week, we’ll have a plan on New York City restaurants,” the governor said, more than two months after indoor dining was shut down.
Indoor dining resumed in New York City with a 25% occupancy limit in early September before it was banned all together again in mid-December.
“I fully understand how difficult it is that they are closed, not just for the restaurants, but for all the people who are employed there,” Cuomo said. “On the flip side is how fast this virus can take off.”
Asked for more details about the plan, Cuomo said: “We’ll have an announcement by the end of the week. But we’re looking at going back to the 25% [capacity] would be the question—and how and when do you do that.”
Declaring “the holiday surge is over,” Cuomo also announced that most orange and yellow zones were being lifted statewide except for a few yellow zones in New York City and one in Orange County.
Among the orange zones being lifted are zones in Westchester and Staten Island. The yellow zones being lifted include Brooklyn, Staten Island, Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester and Rockland.
However, two yellow zones will stay in place in the Bronx as well as one each in Queens, Washington Heights and Newburgh.
Cuomo said the COVID positivity rate and hospitalization rate were on the decline statewide after surging around the holidays.
“I think at this point it's safe to say the holiday surge was anticipated. The holiday surge did happen. But the holiday surge is over,” the governor said.
Cuomo said the state's positivity rate on a seven-day average reached a high of 7.94% on Jan. 4. That was down to 5.64% on Tuesday.
“We are in a good place all across the state,” he said. "Different curves in different regions, but every curve statewide is down."
Cuomo noted that the positivity rate in the Bronx is "significantly higher than surrounding counties" at 6.98%. He said he has spoken with de Blasio about partnering to open a mass vaccination site at Yankee Stadium.
"The Bronx has a very high positivity. We want to get that positivity rate down," the governor said.
The state's positivity rate was 5.44%, down from 6.79% the day before. There were 11,028 new cases and another 170 deaths.
Despite an improvement in the state's numbers, Cuomo said "the new strains are a real concern."
“The COVID threat is not over. We still have to be careful about hospital capacity. And if we run out of hospital capacity […] it will happen because a new strain happens and the staff winds up sick,” he said.
State Health Commissioner Howard Zucker said U.K. variant cases have so far been identified in New York City and nine counties. There are now 42 cases of the variant statewide, including in Brooklyn, Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester.