Los Angeles Won't Reopen Theaters in Near Future, Even If State Allows It

Despite new policies implemented Friday by California governor Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles County [...]

Despite new policies implemented Friday by California governor Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles County officials have released a statement confirming movie theaters, amidst many other public businesses, will remain closed for the foreseeable future. Using a four-tiered system with colors, Californian counties have received one of four designations — purple (widespread), red (substantial), orange (moderate), or yellow (minimal) — that coincides with the current coronavirus outbreaks in the respective counties.

The purple level, or widespread, means that "most non-essential indoor business operations are closed" while counties at the red level can have some businesses open. Los Angeles is currently straddling the line the two, forcing the Los Angeles Public Health department to hand down a ruling of their own.

"Earlier today, the State revised their recovery roadmap and created an updated Tier Framework that classifies each California County based on their daily case rate and positivity rate. L.A. County has been placed in Tier 1 (purple) based on our average daily case rate for the prior two weeks of 13.1 new cases per 100,000 residents. Tier 1 is characterized by widespread community transmission," the county said in a statement obtained by Deadline.

The statement added, "Although the State today revised slightly the list of permitted activities in Tier 1 to allow for the re-opening of both hair salons for indoor services and indoor shopping centers for permitted retail establishments, the County Health Officer Order has not been changed to permit these re-openings. As such, since County orders may be more restrictive than State guidance, all current restrictions remain in place until the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and the Board of Supervisors have an opportunity to review the suggested guidance from the State and take actions that are appropriate for our County."

In a follow-up tweet, the public health department confirmed movie theaters are one of the businesses to remain closed as it fits in with "indoor services and indoor shopping centers."

When do you plan on returning to theaters? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section!

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