ALBANY – Governor Cuomo today launched the $100 million New York Forward Loan Fund to provide flexible and affordable loans to help small businesses, focusing on minority and women-owned small businesses, that did not receive federal COVID-19 assistance.
The state will take a smart, targeted approach for distributing these loans, focusing on businesses with 20 or fewer employees and less than $3 million in gross revenues. Businesses interested in receiving a loan should visit esd.ny.gov/nyforwardloans.
ALBANY – Governor Cuomo today announced that, beginning Thursday, religious gatherings statewide will be allowed, but limited to 10 people practicing strict social distancing and wearing masks. Additionally, drive-in and parking lot services will also be allowed beginning Thursday.
The Governor also announced the state is convening an Interfaith Advisory Council to discuss proposals to safely bring back religious services. For list of the members of the Interfaith Advisory Council, click here.
ALBANY – All of the state except New York City is moving quickly toward opening.
Earlier today, Governor Cuomo announced that the Capital Region has met all seven metrics required to begin phase one of the state’s regional phased reopening plan starting tomorrow, joining the Western New York, Central New York, North Country, Finger Lakes, Southern Tier and Mohawk Valley Regions.
ALBANY – Governor Cuomo today announced New York State has doubled testing capacity to reach 40,000 diagnostic tests per day, and encouraged eligible New Yorkers to visit a new website to find a nearby testing site.
Today’s announcement comes three weeks after the governor announced an agreement for the state to work with the federal government to grow New York’s daily testing capacity from 20,000 tests a day to 40,000 tests a day.
ALBANY – The two hardest hit counties outside New York City – suburban Westchester and Long Island’s Suffolk – are now eligible to resume elective surgeries and ambulatory, Governor Cuomo announced today at his daily briefing.
They join 49 other New York State counties where hospitals can also do so, including Otsego.
ALBANY – Phase One of Governor Cuomo’s un-PAUSE New York isn’t a return to anything goes.
Today, in announcing Central New York (Syracuse) has joined four of the state’s other economic development regions – including Otsego County’s Mohawk Valley region – he also ticked off a few dozen measures, from masks to continued closings, aimed at preventing a coronavirus flare-up.
He also detailed parameters that must be met before beaches can be opened this summer.
“We expect to see an increase but that increase has to be monitored and has to be controlled,” he said. “We’ve talked about the infection rate, the rate of transmission. When the rate of transmission hits 1.1, you’re headed towards a bad place so monitor that rate daily and correct immediately if you see an increase in those numbers.”
SYRACUSE – Governor Cuomo today announced New York is the first state to issue criteria to healthcare professionals defining the Kawasaki disease, a suspected COVID-related inflammatory illness in children.
The criteria establishes a new name for the syndrome – pediatric multi-system inflammatory syndrome – and a definition of what symptoms healthcare providers should look for. Case definitions also help standardize tracking and reporting and can help ensure a better health outcome.
IRONDEQUOIT – In his daily briefing, Governor Cuomo today announced that as of today, the Mohawk Valley, including Otsego County, the Finger Lakes and Southern Tier Regions have met all seven metrics required to begin Phase One of a phased reopening when PAUSE orders expire May 15.
These three regions can begin opening businesses for Phase One: construction, manufacturing and wholesale supply chain, retail for curbside pickup and drop-off or in-store pickup, and agriculture, forestry and fishing.
ALBANY – In his daily briefing, Governor Cuomo announced that New York State is collaborating with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a blueprint to reimagine education in the “new normal.”
As New York begins to develop plans to reopen K-12 schools and colleges, the state and the Gates Foundation will consider what education should look like in the future, including:
ROCHESTER – At his daily briefing, Governor Cuomo outlined additional guidelines that met precede the reopening of the state’s 10 economic development regions, including the Mohawk Valley, which includes Otsego County.
“Reopening is more difficult than the closedown,” he said. “…When you go to restart, the reopening, now knowing what we know, it’s more nuanced. You have to be more careful. And again, no one has done this before, and no one has been here before. So, first, start by learning the lessons that we did learn through this experience.”
QUEENS – Statewide, the Cuomo Administration has administered 15,000 test for antibodies, and has seen the coronavirus infection rate for the whole state drop from 14 percent to 12.3 percent, the governor said at today’s briefing.
“Statewide, you see it’s basically flat,” he said. “This is predominantly an issue for New York City, then Long Island, then the northern suburbs, then the rest of the state.” although it has been “problematic” in the Buffalo area.
In the state’s Mohawk Valley region, which includes Otsego County, 2.7 percent of antibody tests were positive. This means those individuals have been exposed to the virus, but don’t necessarily have the disease.
ALBANY – Governor Cuomo Wednesday announced that New York State’s contract-tracing program, headed up by former NYC mayor Mike Bloomberg, will deploy 30 “contact tracers” per 100,000 people to areas with the highest rates of infection and regions that data shows could be the first to open.
Planned in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut through the next flu season, program is expected to have 6,400 to 17,000 tracers statewide depending on the projected number of cases, working remotely using specially developed software.
It included four steps aimed at preventing COVID-19:
ALBANY – Governor Cuomo Tuesday outlined 12 guidelines the Empire State’s regions must follow to move out of State of Emergency restrictions.
In addition to the Mohawk Valley Economic Development Region, which includes Otsego County, they are Capital Region, Central New York, Finger Lakes, Mid-Hudson Valley, New York City, North Country, Long Island, Southern Tier and Western New York.
ALBANY – In his daily briefing, Governor Cuomo underscored his intention to open, not all, but “many parts of the state” when the un-PAUSE deadline arrives May 15.
“You know your business,” Cuomo said today, addressing construction firms and manufacturers that are first in line to reopen. “I don’t know your business … How do you incorporate into how you do your business and where you do your business, the precautions that we want to take going forward?
“How do you do social distancing, how do you do monitoring, are you going to take the temperature of people who walk in the door, et cetera, and that’s for government but it’s also a question for business.”
ALBANY – In today’s briefing, Governor Cuomo said Upstate regions – including Otsego County’s – may reopen May 15 if individual regions experience 14 days of declining coronarivus infection rates at that time.
In response to a question, he specified “Central New York, the North Country, the Mohawk Valley” as the region’s likely to be the first come out of the shutdown that began when President Trump and Cuomo declared states of emergency on March 13.
