SACRAMENTO, Calif. (CN) — Staving off another weekend rush on Southern California beaches, Governor Gavin Newsom on Thursday ignored pleas from local officials and ordered the closure of Orange County beaches to stem the spread of the coronavirus.
Newsom said photos taken last weekend of the county’s famed beaches packed with beachgoers and advice from public health officials spurred the decision to single out Orange County, the state’s third largest. For now, many beaches in nearby counties like Ventura, San Diego and elsewhere in the state will remain open in a limited capacity.
“The conditions last week, the images we saw at a few of our beaches, were disturbing,” Newsom said during a press briefing.
Many state parks and beaches have been closed over the last several weeks, but last weekend many counties and cities eased off and allowed residents to enjoy California’s famous coastline. With record-breaking temperatures gripping much of the state, tens of thousands flocked to beaches in Orange County to escape the heat and the quarantine.
Photos and aerial footage unsurprisingly went viral and led to Newsom’s decision to ground beachgoers.
The “hard close” of the county’s well-known beaches like Newport, Laguna and Huntington, goes against the will of some cities and lawmakers that want to keep the beaches open to the public during the pandemic.
Newsom complimented counties like Los Angeles and San Diego for preventing overcrowding and “meeting the moment,” but remains concerned about Orange County. He said the state is working with the county on new guidelines to reopen the beaches.
“We’re going to do a hard close,” Newsom said. “If we can get some framework and guidelines to get this right, we can reopen very, very quickly.”
A memo circulated late Wednesday by state police chiefs claimed Newsom was preparing to close not just Orange County, but all state and public beaches. Rather than squash the rumors, Newsom’s office declined to comment to various media outlets and allowed the inaccurate news to reach millions as they woke.
But Newsom said his office was merely reaching out to local officials for guidance and input — and did not flip-flop on a statewide ban.
“I can’t square what others may have said,” Newsom said in response to a question on the apparently false memo.
While Newsom singled out Orange County in his beach closure order, no other Southern California city felt the governor’s comments more than Newport Beach.
Earlier this week, its City Council voted 5-2 to keep its beaches open despite the throng of people who took to the shore. Images that circulated on social media became national news and yet city leaders decided that the beach access was essential for the health and well-being of its residents. At least one City Council member called the media’s photos of swelling crowds inaccurate.
Councilman Jeff Herdman voted to close the beaches to follow the state’s public health orders. City officials estimate 40,000 people flocked to Newport Beach on April 25.
“It’s very embarrassing. The whole reason for this order is because of what happened in Newport Beach last week and the council majority’s vote on Tuesday night to not close beaches,” Herdman told Courthouse News.
David Carrillo, executive director of UC Berkeley's California Constitution Center, said Newsom’s March 4 state of emergency order trumps city and county autonomy.
“Newport Beach is a charter city, so ordinarily it might have some arguments about local autonomy. But we're now under a statewide emergency declaration, and in an emergency the state assumes primary responsibility over the coordinated response, so the governor can close state beaches even if a local ordinance would keep them open,” Carrillo said in an interview.