Gov. Bill Lee announces guidelines to reopen economy

JACKSON, Tenn. — Gov. Bill Lee announced his guidelines for reopening the economy next week.

“COVID-19 is unprecedented in a rapidly evolving threat that fazes not only Tennessee, but the whole world,” Gov. Lee said.

Friday, Gov. Lee issued the first steps from the Tennessee Pledge, with guidance and best practices for businesses to keep employees and customers safe due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Gov. Lee said the first to receive guidance will include restaurants and retail businesses.

“We want to work, by the way, with the remaining six counties to make sure that those largest metro areas develop their own unique reopening strategy that will be complementary to the work that we are doing,” Gov. Lee said.

Gov. Lee said Friday’s announcement is the first step in a phased reopening of the state’s economy, which means rebooting industries safely in 89 counties, excluding Madison, Shelby, Davidson and other metropolitan areas.

Gov. Lee announced restaurants are able to reopen Monday at 50 percent occupancy. Retailers are able to reopen on Wednesday at 50 percent occupancy. The state recommends that employees in both industries wear cloth face coverings and that business owners follow federal guidelines for hygiene and workplace sanitation.

Gov. Lee says it’s important to continue practice social distancing and following Centers for Disease Control guidelines.

“Social distancing works, and it absolutely must continue if we are going to reopen our economy safely. Tennesseans, you have done what we have asked you to do and we need to keep it up a little while longer, and if we can do that we can rebuild livelihood while we continue to safe lives and until there is a vaccine it is imperative that we all work together,” Gov. Lee said.

Tennessee Department of Tourist Development Commissioner Mark Ezell discussed guidelines for travel.

“We know right now that we are not encouraging travel from other states to come into our communities because in this careful phase approach our most important priority again is the safety of all Tennesseans,” Ezell said.

If the number of cases continue to rise, reopening will need to be reversed.

“The data decisions that really drove our fight to slow the spread of it, that is the same kind of data that we will watch going forward and we will make decisions about particular issues as we see something happen,” Gov. Lee said.

He says in the last month, unemployment rates and revenue loss have increased due to the pandemic.

“On the economic front, 15 percent of Tennessee’s workforce filed unemployment claims as of this week. That is more than 400,000 Tennesseans without a job. In March alone there was an $870 million loss of revenue across some of Tennessee’s largest industries as both employers and employees struggles state officials predict a $5 billion loss in the gross domestic product in Tennessee in 2020,” Gov. Lee said.