America Is Officially in ‘f### It’ Mode
Yosemite National Park settles on a reopening dateAfter being closed for more than two months due to the coronavirus pandemic, Yosemite National Park is ready to reopen as soon as next Wednesday or Thursday, but the plan hinges on state health officials granting approval for campsites and hotels to reopen in the surrounding communities to handle many of the overnight visitors.
Note, the letter is not a request from park officials to the state, but from local tourism bureaus etc.
But here's where we get to f### it mode
Already, they say, crowds have arrived since Easter on sunny weekends, and with few places to stay, have camped illegally, left trash and even caused several small fires in counties around Yosemite. “We need to get campgrounds open and we need to get our hotels running so that when the park opens we can handle it. The people are coming anyway,” said Kevin Cann, chairman of the Mariposa County Board of Supervisors.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/06/03/yosemite-national-park-settles-on-reopening-date/Basically, this is a PR war that the local counties are waging to get lodging open. This is in part a response to the state very quietly moving the goalposts. When Newsom announced we were moving to Stage 2, he included lodging for leisure travel in Stage 3. Just recently they changed Stage 3 to allow
Travel for permissible activities, such as healthcare, food, stages 1-3 work, and local or activities shopping related to open sectors.
They pushed general travel for tourism out to Stage 4, concurrent with stadium events.
Stage 4: End of stay at home order
Gradually open larger gathering venues at a pace consistent with public health and safety, such as nightclubs, concert venues, and live audience sports.
Gradually resume remaining activities and travel.
At that point, the tourism bureaus all freaked out. That could essentially mean all lodging in CA closed until there is a vaccine, so at least late 2021, but who knows. A vaccine or herd immunity could take years.
https://covid19.ca.gov/roadmap/#top