The Phase 1 seems reasonable but I think it should have started last Friday, not May 1st.
From the article:
“Abbott’s plan to allow businesses to reopen consists of two phases. Beginning Friday, May 1, all retail stores, restaurants, movie theaters, malls, museums, libraries, churches and places of worship can reopen with occupancy limited to no more than 25 percent. Interactive exhibits at museums and libraries must remain closed at this time.
“Once two weeks of state data show no flareups of COVID-19, Abbott said he hopes the state can progress to phase 2 on May 18. Phase 2 would increase occupancy for the above-listed businesses to 50 percent.
“Phase one also allows for outdoor sports with no more than four players to resume. All licensed healthcare professionals are allowed to return to work, but hospitals must reserve 15 percent of capacity for COVID-19 patients.
“Barbershops, hair salons, bars and gyms must remain closed at this time. Abbott said he hopes to reopen these businesses by mid-May.”
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Me again. I think this sounds fairly rational, though I think that even salons, etc., should be able to open on a limited basis right now.
I went out today (for the first time in three weeks) to buy a few necessities and I noticed that every business that was not a restaurant, bar, gym, dentist, or salon had cars in front of it. (Plenty of restaurants had cars, but presumably that’s all about take-out orders.) It seemed that most general retail establishments were open, and a lot of specialty businesses as well. I would not be at all surprised to see a lot of Texans just start back to business as usual (but with rational precautions) this week. A prominent Houston restaurant opened last week with a lot of precautions in place. No city or county police, sheriff, fire marshal, etc., would claim authority to issue him a citation. (By contrast, a Dallas salon owner who opened up last week was issued a citation and fine by the Dallas police.)
I was really disgusted with Abbott for not doing something like this over a week ago. Instead he appointed what he called a “strike force” of something like 50 people to come up with a plan and advise him. I could have come up with this plan all by myself with a scratch pad and a pencil on April 1st. (No, I don’t think that’s hindsight: this is the sort of thing that Bill’s been talking about since the beginning.) But at least he’s doing more or less the right thing now.