Thread by @shayshinecastle

Hey, #Boulder, sorry I'm a little late in our usual Tuesday night greeting. Trying to put together a story and read through some CORA documents. When news breaks, it breaks all at once.

Anyway, it's city council night. "For yourselves weep ye, and for your children."

I like a little biblical quote to start a council meeting. Feels right. Plus, what else am I really doing with my knowledge of the Bible these days? Not much, let me tell you.

A rare meeting where we'll have Spanish interpretation bc we're talking about mobile homes later.

Also prairie dogs and finalizing ballot content. Some other stuff, too.

Oh, totally forgot this. Open comment is being moved after the public hearing on mobile homes, because of the interpretation. They're going to provide that for the COVID briefing, too, which is nice.

First technical difficulty of the evening! 4 min in... a new record.

Having my own technical difficulties. COVID briefing now. Here's the presentation: www-static.bouldercolorado.gov/docs/Item_1A_C…

"We're doing a good job in Boulder County," says Jeff Zayach, exec director of BoCo Public Health. Consistently among the lowest for case-count in the state.

We had a spike in mid-June, Zayach says, associated with parties on the Hill, that put us "in an outbreak" situation. "Luckily," that was isolated to the Hill.

That's important to consider now, he says.

Zayach: It takes a lot of work to keep outbreaks from spreading throughout the community. Typically 4-5 contacts for every positive person. It takes hours to do investigations.

We've been spending a lot of time, as has CU, "to keep this from happening again," Zayach says.

CU will be presenting later.

5-day average of new cases in BoCo: 11 (back up a bit from this weekend, it looks like)

Testing capacity: Good

Target for % of positive tests is below 5%, Zayach says. If you're below that, you're doing enough testing to catch cases early and prevent spread.

Boulder is at ~2% and has been consistently under 4% since late May.

Boulder is back on top when it comes to cases per 100K residents. (Longmont was slightly above us previously) We're No. 1!

Still disproportionately impacting Latinx population. County is working to hire someone specific to that. Should be in the next week.

Seems like that took a long time... We're in month 5.5 of this.

All BoCo deaths (so far) have been 50+ years old, but 20-29 y.o. still have the most cases.

Boulder County's hospitalization rate is half that of Colorado's. We've kept hospitalizations low since May, Zayach says.

"Some great news," Zayach says: We're masking at high numbers. 90%+ in the county (Boulder is at 96%)

Our social distancing is not so great: 3.4 out of 5, behind everyone but Lyons and Ned (in the county)

Back in mid July we were at 41% social distancing, Zayach says. "We were extremely concerned at that point."

In the beginning of COVID, we were over 80%. Now we're in the 70% range, according to Zayach.

Zayach: "If we can keep it up, we will be in a good position over the holidays."

Our R-naught (reproductive number) is below 1, which is the goal. That means every positive case infects fewer than one other person.

We're currently in the Safer At Home phase. To move into the next phase (Protect Our Neighbors) there are 9 metrics to do so; we're currently meeting 5.

Zayach: I'm not anticipating we can move to that next phase, especially as we head into fall with the flu.

Only 1 Colorado county has been allowed to ease restrictions.

Zayach on working with CU: "We have invested a lot of time and a lot of effort. None of us are taking (this) lightly."

Zayach: University officials are "110% invested" in this and "110% behind" what public health officials want.

Still only 1 case of outdoor transmission Zayach is aware of, from that yoga class we mentioned months ago. (They were within 6 ft of each other doing yoga)

20X less risky outdoors than indoors, he says.

Friend: I'm concerned as the weather changes, we'll be indoor more.

Zayach: "Absolutely. Anytime we're moving indoors, we're going to have more risk." Do these 3 things: Masks, social distancing, hand washing.

Friend: Are you satisfied with testing of off-campus students? (This is regarding the parties on the Hill)
Zayach: I'm gonna let CU talk about that.

That annoys me a little bit. She's not asking CU what CU thinks about how they're doing; she's asking the public health director what HE thinks of what CU is doing.

Young asks about the Latinx cases, which are high.
Zayach: We're not where we need to be. There are some folks who don't feel comfortable getting testing. We're going to be doing mobile testing; working on funding now to expand that.

Zayach: "Until we get that funding, we can't build that capacity we need. ... That is not an OK statistic and we've got to change it."

I'll keep this thread for CU, up now. Presentation: www-static.bouldercolorado.gov/docs/Item_1A_C…

One thing I don't see in here (though I'll keep looking) is a total # of positive cases at CU. There has been criticism of how CU is tallying those, with a weekly rolling total. Daily Camera reported they would start reporting a total, total, but I don't think it's happened yet.

I see testing numbers .... I see diagnostic testing numbers (32, for today) and positive cases (2, for today) and students in isolation (4, for today) but nothing cumulative about positives

This is why you don't put the government in charge of information. One thing everyone wants to know: How many positive cases so far? How hard is that to answer?

Kudos to Mitch and Katie at the DC for pushing on this, and doing their own totals.

Sorry, I don't know what those are but lemme check real quick.

The Camera is all over it. (Kudos to Brooklyn, who wrote this)15 cases since the first day of class + 16 positive tests during move-in so... 31 dailycamera.com/2020/09/01/cu-…

By Aug. 1 "virtually all" of furloughed staff were back on campus, CU says.

Patrick O'Rourke: We need to amend our dashboard (for how we report tests and positives)

"We are now keeping track of cumulative totals" throughout the semester, O'Rourke says. But it's important to note, he says, that this will only capture CU testing — not every CU student, who might get a test elsewhere.

"You are breaking up completely." (Weaver)

Things that apply to Zoom calls and relationships.

Devin Cramer is going to be addressing gatherings on the Hill and what CU/landlords/cops are doing about it.

8 addresses received warnings during the first weekend

All 8 had personal meetings with CU, Cramer says. "The meetings were interested. The students were confused" as to what the public health orders are.

30 students going through a "conduct process" related to partying, etc.

First violation: Removed from campus for 2 weeks
Second violation: Suspension

Frances Draper: Officers will be patrolling the Hill on Thursday - Saturday nights. Boulder PD and CU PD are on that, and CU is helping cover the cost of overtime for city cops.

Devin Cramer: It used to take 7-14 days to get police reports. Now we're getting them every week from the weekend prior. So we can act more quickly.

Young asks about providing psychologists. "It's like putting someone who really likes candy in a candy store and telling them they can't have any candy."

"They're gonna do what they're gonna do. It's just the age they're at."

O'Rourke: We've gotten some messages back recently that said things like 'We get it, stop threatening us' and 'You're not going to punish us into compliance.'

So we do need to approach this from a behavioral, psychological standpoint.

O'Rourke: We don't want to "drive these parties underground" and inside, "where the risk of transmission is higher."

"We need to recognize there are certain environments and choices that are better for them to make."

Lots of qs about the filtration system and cleaning.

Young: Frontline staff are not being tested as frequently as students and it seems like they're in the same conditions. They should be tested at least as frequently.

Wallach: What happens if you get excluded from campus? What does that mean?
Cramer: You're not allowed to use on-campus services or attend classes.

We would make an exception if they needed to be tested, Cramer says.

Wallach: How do you monitor this? Is your name on a list if you walk into a class?

Cramer: No you're name is not on a list. But if you show up and we're aware of it, you'll likely be suspended for the semester. That's a fairly powerful deterrent, we've found.

Friend asks for total positive tests! (CU officials checking that) And how many were asymptomatic? How many were off-campus vs. on? Students v. staff?

Officials still looking it up.
Friend: Sorry, I thought that would be a softball.

Zing.

O'Rourke: 15 total cases since classes started. "A mix" of asymptomatic and symptom-driven, but I can't give you specifics.

I think that's a wrap on this one. I'm sorry I didn't tweet everything; was writing. Mayor Weaver asks for regular updates, "maybe more than once a month" and followup on unanswered qs tonight.

Draper: We've had some recent improvement in terms of parties on the Hill. I'm not counting our chickens before they hatch but we hope that continues.

@threadreaderapp please unroll. Thanks!