AUSTIN, Texas — Barbershops and nail, hair, beauty and tanning salons can reopen in Texas on Friday under certain restrictions, but Austin Mayor Steve Adler fears this may be happening too soon.
KVUE's Ashley Goudeau spoke with Mayor Adler about his concerns.
On the barbershops and salons reopening this Friday:
Adler: "I think we have to be really cautious. And as we dip our toe, we have to get the data and the information to see what's happening with infections and hospitalizations. ... I'm real concerned about the barbers and the stylists who, over the course of a day, are going to have that kind of close contact with somebody. ... I just don't think we can adequately protect them. And we don't know if the face covering is going to be enough, if the gloves are going to be enough. ... I want to see the data, and it's going to take us three or four weeks until we can see what happens to hospitalizations because of the behaviors we're doing now."
On whether to allow city pools to reopen:
Adler: "The answer to that is no, and for the same reason [that] we don't know what these additional physical interactions are going to cause. So pools, libraries, things that the city can control, we're going to keep closed. We're not asking city employees to come to work unless they're essential, at least through the end of the month, until we can see what happens with the numbers. I just don't want us to take chances. This is still a very deadly disease, still very infectious disease, and we need to treat it that way."
On a mayor's authority to extend the city's order following Gov. Greg Abbott's statewide orders:
Adler: "The governor's order says that cities are not allowed to adopt orders that are in conflict with it. That's always been the rule. We've issued our orders. We're going to issue another one, either tomorrow or Friday, that allows people to go to all of the reopened businesses that the governor has. So our order is not going to be inconsistent with his. We are going to go into a little bit more detail of what's required of people, construction sites and the like. So it'll be our old order extended for time but including the provisions that the governor has changed."
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