Inslee Says Re-Openings Depend Upon Data, Stay At Home Still On

Gov. Jay Inslee held an address Monday evening, laying what he called his Plan for Washington and it's recovery from COVID-19.

He opened his remarks by, for the first time, acknowledging there have been discussions with various construction, medical and other industry leaders, and he said "if healthy modeling holds up" there could be lifting of many restrictions. There appeared to initially be a glimmer of hope for citizens.

However he said it "depends upon the data," referring to the models he's relied upon to determine his policies.  He also spoke of creating three leadership groups reportedly involving leaders and others from all over the state to help facilitate the recovery but based upon social media input on his own official governor's Facebook, that came across as vague and confusing with little detail.

The rest of his address was largely a re visit of previous conferences when he spoke of increased testing, he mentioned again his "fire He brigade" idea of having an army of fast response testers who would enable people with symptoms to be rapidly diagnosed.

He claimed his approach is not entirely different from "other states," he referenced Republican and Democratic governors, but given his 'pact' with the governors of OR and CA, it's likely his approach follows their models.

He used part of his address to push for government involvement in broadband and other technologies now being used due to social distancing.  After sounding like there would be hope with many possible re openings in the beginning of address, he appeared to contradict himself by saying this could be with us for months in the future and it could come "roaring back."

For now, nothing changes. According to him, it will be up to the data in the next two weeks to determine what happens--including re-openings.

Click on the button below to watch the address for yourself.