Custer County’s elected commissioners voted Thursday to defy the state’s remaining COVID-19 restrictions by allowing all businesses to reopen at full capacity.
The vote, first reported by CBS4, lifted restrictions immediately. Commissioners said they will meet again to reassess the effects of opening on Wednesday, which is likely too early to tell if it had any effect on transmission of the novel coronavirus. Increases in transmission take up to two weeks to show up in the numbers after a policy change.
Dr. Clifford Brown, director of the Custer County Public Health Agency, told board members that a consistent decline in new COVID-19 cases and successful efforts to vaccinate at-risk individuals merited the reopening.
Custer County, with an estimated population of about 5,000, has reported 164 positive cases and one death since the pandemic began last year.
The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment didn’t immediately answer questions about whether it would do anything to respond to the vote, but released a statement Thursday night urging counties to “remain diligent.”
“While counties can always choose more protective public health protocols, they have to at least comply with the state dial,” the statement said.
Custer County was in Level Blue on the state’s dial framework, which allows most businesses to operate at 50% of capacity, with customer caps ranging from 50 to 250, depending on the activity. To move down to Level Green, which would keep the 50% limit but raise the cap to 500 people, the county would have to apply to the state and show it has a plan to manage any potential increase in cases.
The county had no positive tests in the last week, and most of its immediate neighbors have low cases and positivity rates. An exception is Saguache County, directly to the west, which had a 7.7% positivity rate over the last week, which suggests they’re missing cases.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
