Boulder announced that on Wednesday it will officially repeal all of the city’s coronavirus-related emergency ordinances.
According to a news release, City Manager Nuria Rivera-Vandermyde concluded the orders can be safely repealed since the threat to public health posed by COVID-19 has diminished.
“The last 2.5 years have not been easy,” Rivera-Vandermyde stated in the release. “I look back with gratitude for our community for working together through the pandemic and now ahead with confidence in a brighter future thanks to all we have learned.”
Among other things, once Wednesday hits, people will resume paying the $25 domestic partnership fee. That fee had previously been waived.
Additionally, while daycare in the home will continue to be allowed, the regulations that Boulder relaxed during the pandemic will once again be required in order to either continue to have an in-home daycare or to start a new one.
Further, the city is eliminating the emergency order related to its public nuisance regulations. This “was needed during the pandemic to address public health order violations and is no longer needed for that purpose,” city spokesperson Shannon Aulabaugh confirmed.
The five ordinances that will officially end on Wednesday are the last of those the city enacted to help protect public health during the pandemic. Boulder has previously repealed other ordinances, including one that canceled all in-person board and commission meetings and another that reopened its COVID-19 Recovery Center.
The CRC, which served as a place of respite for people experiencing homelessness who were exhibiting symptoms or who tested positive for coronavirus, closed for the second time on April 29, according to Housing and Human Services spokesperson Lyndsy Morse-Casillas.
When Boulder’s unhoused residents test positive for covid, the shelter currently works with Boulder County Public Health to provide them a place to quarantine outside of the Boulder Shelter.
“The Shelter doesn’t have the ability to provide people with isolated space for that,” Interim Shelter Director Spencer Downing wrote in an email.
“Of course, this situation changes rapidly,” he added. “We notice lower numbers and won’t be surprised if Public Health encourages new practices if that maintains.”
With the end of emergency orders, Boulder City Council will return to meeting in person at the Municipal Building on Sept. 1. The public will return in October. Boulder is working on the technology needed to allow its boards and commissions to conduct hybrid meetings. In the short term, these meetings will remain hybrid.
