Coronavirus In Colorado; The Numbers

According to today's data release, in Colorado there have been 142,667 people tested, 23,487 positive cases, 4,082 hospitalized, 1,324 deaths among cases (1,088 deaths due to COVID), 260 outbreaks at residential and non-hospital health care facilities, 60 of 64 counties with positive cases. In Adams County we have 2,802 cases and 111 deaths.  Read More from CDPHE HERE

Gov. Polis Takes Action To Prepare For Wildfire Response, Releases Guidance On Civil Rights Protections

Gov. Polis signed Executive Order D 2020 072 directing the transfer of funds from the Disaster Emergency Fund to the Wildfire Emergency Response Fund so it has sufficient funds to assist local jurisdictions. The administration also released guidance to employers and places of public accommodation to ensure equal opportunity employment and to provide reasonable accommodations for individuals, including those with COVID-19, exposure to COVID-19, and symptoms of COVID-19. Read More from Governor Jared Polis HERE

Coronavirus Is Changing This Year’s Memorial Day Tributes At Fort Logan And Other National Cemeteries

America will recognize its fallen service members this Memorial Day, as it has for more than a hundred years. But for those wishing to visit memorials and cemeteries, there will be many limitations because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Each VA National Cemetery is scheduled to hold a Memorial Day wreath-laying ceremony, followed by a moment of silence and the playing of Taps. But the public may not attend those ceremonies. The National Cemeteries will be open for visitation over the long weekend, though visitors may not congregate in groups. Read More from CPR HERE

How Colorado Lawmakers Closed A $3 Billion Shortfall To Balance The Budget And Why It Led To Tears

To address a $3 billion shortfall, Colorado lawmakers made a series of drastic spending cuts and moved close to finalizing a state budget battered by the coronavirus and the paralyzed economy. The legislative budget committee on Thursday cut $448 million from K-12 education — a 10% cut compared to a year ago. The actual cut is closer to $577 million for school districts, in part from increased costs this year. Earlier in the week, lawmakers slashed $493 million from the state’s colleges and universities, a total that represents 58% of the higher education budget. In addition, the committee approved a 5% reduction — totaling $111 million — in the set-aside for state employee salaries may lead to furloughs, eliminating vacant positions or hiring freezes. The draft spending plan also is predicated on forthcoming legislation that will remove unspecified tax breaks to generate about $100 million in new revenue. The size of the budget shortfall in Colorado is unprecedented — 25% of current spending — and it took the Joint Budget Committee three weeks to make the necessary cuts to balance the budget. Read More from The Colorado Sun HERE

Joint Budget Committee Cuts $724 Million From K-12 In Final Attempt To Balance The 2020-21 Budget

With time running out to find the money to balance the 2020-21 budget, the Joint Budget Committee Thursday took their biggest cut of all: $724 million from K-12 education. The vote was unanimous and painful. For nearly three weeks, the JBC has been trying to find money anywhere they could to cover a $3.3 billion shortfall in general fund revenues for 2020-21. But with a budget bill due to the General Assembly next week and still short $802.1 million, the committee did what it hoped it wouldn't have to do. Read More from Colorado Politics HERE

College Board Hit With A Class-Action Lawsuit After Online AP Testing Snafus

Colorado students are finishing up their Advanced Placement exams this week, and for many, it was anything but a smooth ride. Thousands of high school students across the country reported trouble submitting test answers because of technical glitches and must now take the high-pressure tests again in June. But a class-action lawsuit on behalf of high school test-takers is aiming to stop the June test. The suit alleges a breach of contract, gross negligence, misrepresentation and violations of the Americans With Disabilities Act. It asks that the College Board accept test answers where students have proof they were completed by timestamp, photo and email. Read More from CPR HERE

Colorado’s Unemployment Rate Hit 11.3% In April, Its Highest-Ever Level

Colorado’s unemployment rate hit 11.3% in April, providing the clearest picture yet of how much the coronavirus crisis has devastated the state’s economy. The rate is the highest recorded since the state began tracking unemployment levels in 1976. The prior record was 8.9% in the fall of 2010, during the fallout of the Great Recession. Colorado’s unemployment rate in April was lower than the national rate of 14.7%, which is the highest recorded since 1948. Colorado also had the 16th lowest unemployment rate in the nation for April. Read More from The Colorado Sun HERE

Colorado Lost More Than "A Wyoming’s Worth" Of Jobs In April

Colorado’s unemployment rate shot up to 11.3% in April as employers in the state shed an estimated 323,500 jobs last month due to the pandemic and related closures. “What happened in April is equivalent to eliminating all wage and salary employment in the Boulder, Pueblo, and Grand Junction metro areas. In Colorado, employment declined by more than the number of wage and salary employees in Wyoming,” said Broomfield economist Gary Horvath. Read More from The Denver Post HERE

Denver Orders Closure Of Facility That Handles All Mail For Colorado And Wyoming

The Denver Department of Public Health and Environment (DDPHE) has ordered the closure of a mail facility that handles all mail for Colorado and Wyoming. The public health order was issued on Thursday to the United States Postal Service (USPS) Processing and Distributing Center at 7550 E. 53rd Place in Denver, following an investigation the day prior. The state of Colorado has confirmed five employees have tested positive for COVID-19 at the facility that employs 1,800. DDPHE issued the closure order even though investigators were unable to see inside the distribution facility. Read More from 9News HERE

Denver Takes Aim At U.S. Postal Service Center Over Alleged COVID-19 Outbreak

Denver public health officials have ordered a United States Postal Service Processing and Distribution Center, which provides mail to all of Colorado and Wyoming, to stop operations — but the center isn’t abiding by local orders. Denver Department of Public Health and Environment officials investigated the facility on Wednesday, following the state reporting multiple confirmed coronavirus cases among employees who work there. Read More from Colorado Politics HERE

Governor Issues Directive Barring Colorado Agencies From Helping With Federal Immigration Enforcement

Gov. Jared Polis quietly issued guidance this week barring state agencies from releasing Coloradans’ personal information to federal entities that plan to use the data for the sole purpose of immigration enforcement. The directive issued Wednesday prevents U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and other federal agencies from gathering data unless they have a court order or are investigating a crime. The four-page executive guidance was issued without public notification and comes after lawmakers were working on a bill this year to outlaw information sharing for immigration purposes between ICE and state offices such as the Colorado Division of Motor Vehicles. Read More from The Colorado Sun HERE

Colorado Will Test For Coronavirus At Every Nursing Home Every Week For 8 Weeks

Watching as even the strictest lockdown measures failed to stop the disease, two researchers at Colorado State University launched a pilot study in mid-March to test employees at five skilled nursing facilities. The results caught Gov. Jared Polis’ eye and now the CSU team, in partnership with the state, will test staff at every one of the state’s skilled nursing facilities weekly for eight weeks. Both state officials and researchers hope that the testing could mark a turning point in controlling COVID-19 in the beleaguered facilities. Read More from CPR HERE

Food-Assistance Requests Keep Soaring In Colorado Despite Slowing Coronavirus Unemployment Claims

Colorado families were struggling with food insecurity before the coronavirus crisis hit the state. Now, the state and advocacy organizations are scrambling to try to keep up with the flood of food assistance requests they’ve received in the wake of job losses and soaring unemployment claims. “Prior to the pandemic, we were looking at about one in every 11 people were struggling with this issue.” said Erin Ulric, implementation director for Colorado Blueprint to End Hunger. “We’re looking at over 40% of families in Colorado right now are food insecure. So, obviously there’s been a significant increase.” Read More from The Colorado Sun HERE

Majority Of Businesses Receiving Paycheck Protection Loans Expect Full Forgiveness

Nationally, 54% of businesses that obtained loans through the federal Paycheck Protection Program expect to receive full forgiveness by keeping workers on payroll during the pandemic. The finding came from a poll by NFIB, which represents small and independent businesses. There were 685 responses from NFIB members, 80% of whom submitted applications to the popular forgivable loan program. Of those, nine in 10 had already received a deposit from the loan. As of May 16, the federal government has approved 96,285 loans for Colorado businesses, totaling $10.3 billion. Read More from Colorado Politics HERE

COVID-19 Shuts Down Many Memorial Day Tributes, Including D.C.’s Poppy Wall Of Honor

This Memorial Day, the National Mall in Washington D.C. will be empty. There will be no honor walls, no public tributes, no large crowds. Instead, many dedications in remembrance of our fallen will be virtual. In years past, USAA’s Poppy Wall of Honor has been a stunning symbol, lighting up the day and the night sky. It's an emotional tribute. Read More from Denver7 HERE

U.S. Senate Will Take Up Bill To Fully Fund Land And Water Conservation Fund, Mitch McConnell Says

When the U.S. Senate returns from its Memorial Day recess in June it will take up a bipartisan bill to fully fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund and direct $1 billion a year to address the backlog of maintenance in the nation’s national parks. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, made the announcement about the Great American Outdoors Act on Thursday afternoon. Read More from The Colorado Sun HERE

Small Businesses Left In Limbo As Senate Waits To Pass PPP Extension

The Senate failed millions of small businesses Thursday by ending its week without passing an extension to the number of weeks that PPP loan recipients have to use their funds. It currently stands at eight weeks, but a bipartisan proposal would double it to 16 weeks. The basic idea is to make the money last longer, particularly for small businesses that are opening slower. This added flexibility could help some loan recipients keep people on payroll for longer. Read More from Axios HERE

Nearly Every U.S. State Had Historic Levels Of Unemployment Last Month, New Data Shows

Roughly one-quarter of the labor force in Nevada, Michigan and Hawaii is unemployed, and nearly every other state registered a record-high jobless rate last month, illustrating the historic, widespread economic havoc wrought by the coronavirus. The dour figures released by the Labor Department on Friday illustrate how closed shops and factories, sharp declines in tourism and a slew of measures meant to arrest the spread of the pandemic have disproportionately walloped some regions more than others, contributing to the highest national unemployment rate since the Great Depression. Read More from The Washington Post HERE

President Trump Says CDC Will Deem Places of Worship Essential

President Trump said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would be issuing new guidelines that designate all places of worship as essential, adding he would overrule any governor who disagreed with him. Mr. Trump said some governors have deemed abortion clinics and liquor stores as essential but didn’t put churches and other places of worship in that category. Read More from The Wall Street Journal HERE

America’s Unemployment Numbers Are Stabilizing. That’s Not A Good Thing

As lockdowns have begun to lift in all 50 states, we might expect the pace of job losses to slow down if businesses are able to reopen and begin bringing workers back (or begin posting jobs for positions that need to be refilled). But if that’s going to happen, it’s tough to find much evidence for it yet. According to data from the employment-search website Indeed, the number of jobs posted by employers last week was only marginally higher than it had been the week before — still down nearly 40 percent year-over-year from the same week in 2019. And, if anything, unemployment claims are dropping more slowly than we might have anticipated just a few weeks ago. Read More from FiveThirtyEight HERE

Virus Crisis Exposes Cascading Weaknesses In U.S. Disaster Response

For decades, the backbone of the nation’s disaster response system — and a hallmark of American generosity — has been its army of volunteers who race toward danger to help shelter, feed and counsel victims of hurricanes, wildfires and other calamities. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed a critical weakness in this system: Most volunteers are older people at higher risk from the virus, so this year they can’t participate in person. Read More from The New York Times HERE

Antimalarial Drug Touted By President Trump Might Be Linked To Increased Risk Of Death In Coronavirus Patients, Study Says

A study of 96,000 hospitalized coronavirus patients on six continents found that those who received an antimalarial drug promoted by President Trump in the fight against the virus had a significantly higher risk of death compared with those who did not. People treated with hydroxychloroquine, or the closely related drug chloroquine, were also more likely to develop a type of irregular heart rhythm, or arrhythmia, that can lead to sudden cardiac death, it concluded. Read More from The Washington Post HERE

CDC Advice On Surface Spread Of COVID-19 Has Not Changed, Agency Says

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is clarifying its guidance to prevent the coronavirus from spreading, hoping to clear up confusion over whether a person can contract the disease by touching surfaces that have the virus on them. The agency says "usability improvements," including a headline change on its web page about preventing viral infection, seemed to trigger news stories saying its guidelines have changed. The main source of the coronavirus's spread, the agency says, is through respiratory droplets from an infected person who coughs, sneezes or talks in close proximity to someone else. Read More from NPR HERE

Community Colleges Aren’t Prepared For This Crisis

Right now, across the country, millions of high-school graduates and their families are facing an undeniable fact: The pandemic has thrown their plans for the future into complete disarray. Many of these families—plus millions of students already midway through a college degree—are going to turn to an institution often overlooked in the national discourse about higher education: community college. But community colleges can only offer a high-quality and affordable education when the government does its part in providing a reliable stream of financial support—and it needs to do so now. Read More from The Atlantic HERE

How The Coronavirus Has Affected Individual Members Of Congress

The coronavirus pandemic has brought much of the daily work of Congress to a halt. House and Senate leaders delayed bringing back members for several weeks because of the outbreak and as public health guidelines recommended continued social distancing. The House approved historic rule changes allowing remote voting and hearings. During the outbreak, the virus has infected several lawmakers and forced many more members to self-quarantine. And it remains an ongoing threat. Read More from NPR HERE

Lawmakers Work To Keep U.S. Space Command In Colorado

Colorado’s U.S. senators are working to make Colorado the permanent home of U.S. Space Command. Last week, the Department of Defense announced it would stay at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs for at least the next six years. On Friday, senators Cory Gardner and Michael Bennet sent a letter to Gov. Jared Polis, asking him for support as they work to make the move permanent. A final decision is expected in January of next year. Read More from CBS4 Denver HERE

Why The Pandemic Is Bad News For The New Space Industry

Politico asked Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck what the burgeoning commercial space industry will look like after the pandemic is over in this week’s Q&A, and his outlook is pretty bleak. Beck predicts small launch companies will likely “weather the brunt” of the economic downturn and halt in venture capital funding caused by the coronavirus outbreak. But they face series headwinds. Read More from Politico HERE  

Food Banks Get The Love, But SNAP Does More To Fight Hunger

Millions of newly impoverished people are turning to the charitable organizations known as food banks. Yet many people who run food banks are ambivalent about all the attention, because they know the limitations of their own operations. They point to a stream of food aid that's far more important than food banks: the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. Read More from NPR HERE

Lifting Lockdowns; The When, Why And How

Since china locked down the city of Wuhan on January 23rd, over a third of the world’s population has at one time or another been shut away at home. It is hard to think of any policy ever having been imposed so widely with such little preparation or debate. But then closing down society was not a thought-out response, so much as a desperate measure for a desperate time. It has slowed the pandemic, but at a terrible price. As they seek to put lockdowns behind them, governments are not thinking hard enough about the costs and benefits of what comes next. Read More from The Economist HERE

Ranking The Global Impact Of The Coronavirus Pandemic, Country By Country

Politico mapped the performance of 30 leading countries by plotting their health and economic outcomes and grouping them based on whether they have instituted light, moderate or severe restrictions on commerce and social interactions. The coronavirus pandemic has spread across countries at different times, and each has responded differently depending on their health and political systems, as well as their economies. Despite some bright spots, nearly every country presents a mixed picture. Read More from Politico HERE

U.K. Announces A Quarantine Of International Travelers, Under Threat Of A £1,000 Fine

Britain will quarantine everyone flying into the country, including citizens, for 14 days beginning June 8 to fight the spread of the coronavirus. On arrival at an airport, travelers will have to provide contact details and an address where they will be staying. Those who flout the self-isolation rules would be fined 1,000 pounds, or about $1,200, and that the government could increase the penalty. Read More from The New York Times HERE

Pakistani Airliner Crashes Near Karachi Airport With 99 Aboard

At least two people survived the crash of a Pakistan International Airlines plane near the Karachi airport Friday. The Airbus A320, which had 99 people aboard, struck a nearby residential neighborhood after experiencing a mechanical failure. In the moments before the crash, the flight’s captain radioed to report difficulties with the landing gear. The pilot then attempted an emergency landing, but the maneuver damaged a fuel tank and sent the plane careering into the nearby neighborhood. Read More from The Washington Post HERE

The Germs That Transformed History

The COVID-19 pandemic is an almost unique phenomenon in world history. The only precedent for its rapid spread to every continent, killing people everywhere and devastating both local economies and world trade, was the flu pandemic of 1918-19. Compared with smallpox and Ebola, they kill only a small percentage of their victims, and their person-to-person transmissibility isn’t unusual. What sets them apart—what has made them world-wide pandemics—is modern transportation. Read More from The Wall Street Journal HERE