Restaurants, gyms slam California virus rules, see closings

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Owners of restaurants, gyms and nail salons criticized California's new rules guiding when businesses can reopen during the coronavirus pandemic, saying the plan will bring financial misery to their industries and further weaken the state's battered economy.

The California Restaurant Association said in a statement Friday that restaurants will continue to close permanently around the state because Gov. Gavin Newsom's plan will continue to keep most indoor dining rooms closed, while others will have strict limits on capacity.

The group called on Newsom to hold a special session of the Legislature to work on an aid package.

Restaurants "are closing for good, by the thousands,” association President Jot Condie said in a statement. The group estimates as many as 1 million restaurant workers have been furloughed or laid off during the pandemic.

Francesca Schuler, an advisory board member of the California Fitness Alliance, called Newsom's revised rules a step backward that would devastate the struggling industry. She said she was perplexed why health clubs are being slapped with stricter limits on capacity than restaurants, especially because customers can work out individually, on spaced-out equipment and wear masks.

“We will not survive this as an industry,” she said.

Newsom's color-coded system for reopening California businesses moves slower and more gradually than the state’s first attempt last spring. Counties will move through the system based on their rate of coronavirus cases and the percentage of positive tests. Previously, the state used several other metrics, like hospitalizations and testing capacity, to determine whether counties could reopen.

But the result for many businesses in a state that has a nation's highest number of...