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FRIDAY, MAY 15, 2020 • SANTA ROSA, CALIFORNIA • PRESSDEMOCRAT.COM

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Child care centers open to all

PHOTOS BY CHRISTOPHER CHUNG / THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Elissa, right, and Kevin DeWolfe are putting their Oakmont-area home on the market with Compass listing agents Karen Moyers and Katie Kelly now that stay-home orders are gradually being relaxed.

Sales rebound expected as virus restrictions ease

Ban on showing occupied homes drives April’s 33% drop in purchases

Elissa and Kevin DeWolfe’s Oakmont home was ready to sell since before the

month of April. The interior and exterior painting on the 3-bed, 2-bath Juniper model home was all finished, and the house, built by Elissa DeWolfe’s parents in 1976, had a brand new roof back in December.

Only one problem: if you wanted to buy the house you couldn’t get in to see it, the result of coronavirus restric-tions that prohibited sellers from showing homes in Sonoma County unless they were

vacant. The DeWolfes still lived there.

So like many other sellers, the couple kept their house on Meadow Creek Lane off the market throughout the month of April.

Their decision, and others like it, contributed to a 33% decline in the number of homes sold in April, compared with last year. It marks the largest decline in home sales in more than a decade during the month of April, a month that usu-ally sees the housing market rebound from the slow winter months.

Everyone will be able to use child care facilities starting Fri-day, thanks to a new Sonoma County health order that fol-lows Gov. Gavin Newsom’s guid-

ance in loosening coronavirus restrictions.

Newsom announced Tuesday that additional businesses could reopen across the state, as long as they followed social distanc-ing guidelines to reduce the risk of spreading or contracting the coronavirus. The new Sonoma County order, effective at 12:01 a.m. Friday, implements the statewide reopening locally.

The directive allows estab-lished child care providers to serve any family, not just those

of essential workers, and comes as Sonoma County supervisors have pressed Dr. Sundari Mase, the county’s public health offi-cer, to reopen certain sectors of the local economy faster.

The revised guidance also al-lows pet groomers, dog walking services, car washes and several other types of businesses to re-sume, though restaurant dining rooms, hair and nail salons and winery tasting rooms remain closed.

“That is really critical as the

economy and everything starts to reopen — you have to have child care for anyone who needs it,” said Melanie Dodson, exec-utive director of Community Child Care Council of Sonoma County, or 4Cs. “That is really good news.”

Sonoma County supervisors applauded the amended order from Mase, while stressing the need to continue lobbying ef-forts at the state level as the county’s gradual reopening takes shape.

California counties have ex-pressed repeated frustration at Gov. Gavin Newsom’s surprise rollout of new orders and initia-tives, with officials likening the process to a form of whiplash.

In Sonoma County, where su-pervisors have urged their pub-lic health officer to stay in lock-step with statewide guidance, new orders challenge officials to quickly pivot to enact localized measures of their own.

New county order also OKs pet groomers, car washes, with restrictionsBy KERRY BENEFIELD, CHANTELLE LEE AND TYLER SILVYTHE PRESS DEMOCRAT

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By MARTIN ESPINOZATHE PRESS DEMOCRAT

TURN TO HOUSING » PAGE A2

SONOMA COUNTY » HOUSING MARKET

A Compass policy for persons visiting a property on the market is posted on the DeWolfes’ Oakmont-area home.

Billions in cuts slated as California revenue drops

SACRAMENTO — California Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed $14 billion in budget cuts on Thursday because of the coronavirus, with more than half coming at the expense of public schools already struggling to educate children from afar during a pandemic.

The cuts are part of a plan to cov-er a $54.3 billion budget deficit caused by plummeting state revenues after a mandatory, statewide stay-at-home

order forced most businesses to close and put more than 4.7 million people out of work.

Thursday, Newsom pro-posed to fill that hole through a combination of cuts, tax in-creases, canceled spending, internal borrowing and tapping the state’s reserves. It also includes a 10% pay cut for all state workers, including the governor himself.

Overall, the $203 billion spending plan is about 5% lower than the bud-get lawmakers approved last year.

“Nothing breaks my heart more than having to make budget cuts,” he said. “There’s a human being behind every single number.”

Newsom said all of those cuts could

be avoided if the federal gov-ernment approves a $1 trillion aid package for state and local governments. The state would need that money before July 1 to avoid the cuts, a daunting task considering the bitter

partisan divide in Congress.“Depending on the federal govern-

ment is not going to be a solution,” said Republican Sen. Jim Nielsen of Red Bluff.

Public education, which accounts for 40% of all state general fund spending, was the hardest hit.

School districts get money based on a formula outlined in the state Consti-

RICH PEDRONCELLI / ASSOCIATED PRESS

Gov. Gavin Newsom discusses his revised 2020-2021 state budget during a news conference Thursday in Sacramento.

Schools, state workers would be among the biggest losers under revised state budgetBy ADAM BEAMASSOCIATED PRESS

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INSIDEBudget cuts could make it difficult to resume in-classroom schooling / A5

City details plan for camp

Santa Rosa’s proposed sanc-tioned encampment to dampen the threat of the coronavirus pandemic to the local homeless population drew a large, curious audience who spent about two hours probing the city’s plan Thursday over the course of a virtual meeting.

The city held the meeting, which drew more than 460 par-ticipants at one point, after receiving more than 100 ques-tions about its plan to erect an encampment that is set to open next week at the Finley Com-munity Center on West College Avenue.

The site will have 70 tents and a total capacity of 140 people, though city staff do not expect that many, and it will be pop-ulated by people who are cur-rently living in encampments like those beneath Highway 101 overpasses downtown where so-cial distancing is lacking.

“The focus is on folks living outside cheek to jowl, sleeping bag to sleeping bag, tent space to tent space, because this is a health emergency,” said Dave Gouin, the city’s director of housing and community ser-vices.

The city expects to spend about $134,000 a month on the Finley site and plans to seek fed-eral reimbursement for this and other pandemic-related costs. Moving to the encampment, which will be managed by Cath-olic Charities of Santa Rosa, will be voluntary for people current-ly living on the streets.

The session was scheduled to run 90 minutes, but with more than a dozen questions pending at the point, the officials on the city’s panel agreed to continue taking questions and hearing feedback from the public.

More than 460 residents turn out to question SR officials about tent siteBy WILL SCHMITTTHE PRESS DEMOCRAT

TURN TO CAMP » PAGE A7

HOMELESSNESS