MoCo, Prince George's Prepare to Begin Modified Phase 2

Dear WANADA Members,

Businesses in Montgomery and Prince George's county will be able to offer limited in-person retail services indoors beginning next week, bringing the counties more or less in line with Northern Virginia and the rest of the Maryland suburbs. This will end the mandate that essential businesses in those counties, including auto dealerships, conduct in-person customer service by appointment only.

Yesterday, Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich announced that his county would likely move into a modified version of Maryland's stage two re-opening "sometime next week." You can click here to view the modified re-open phases that will be implemented in Montgomery County; they incorporate much of Gov. Larry Hogan's expanded stage two provisions, including the re-opening of indoor dining that was announced yesterday.

Importantly for auto dealers and other indoor retailers, the capacity restrictions do remain somewhat different from the state's stage two allowance of up to 50 percent patron capacity. According to Montgomery County's plan, indoor retail businesses will be allowed to have one patron for every 200 square feet of sales space, and "outdoor gatherings" will also be subject to the same limits.

Earlier today, Prince George's County Executive Angela Alsobrooks announced that her county would enter a modified stage two on Monday, owing to the progress being made in reducing the rate of positive COVID-19 tests. Prince George's has not provided a firm outline of what the loosened capacity restrictions at indoor businesses will look like, but we anticipate the guidelines to be largely similar to those in Montgomery. Every other county in Maryland, besides the two mentioned above and Baltimore city, have already fully adopted the stage two plan.

As we mentioned, Northern Virginia will enter phase two of the Forward Virginia plan tomorrow, which, like Maryland's expanded stage two order, will allow for indoor dining, a limited re-opening of gyms, and larger operations at certain outdoor entertainment venues. Virginia's stage two does not really impact operations for auto dealers, who were already allowed to offer indoor retail services at up to 50 percent of the establishment's lowest capacity.

As always, we encourage you to review the pertinent restrictions and best practices that your state and local governments have produced, and to continue prioritizing social distancing and cleanliness in your businesses. Both Virginia and Maryland's latest orders are enforceable by the state departments of health, and Maryland counties will continue conducting their own compliance efforts as well. 

Keep in mind that, across our region, masks remain required for both patrons and employees, and will likely remain that way for some time. As for t he District of Columbia, which has no new auto dealerships, the city will likely move to their version of a phase two on June 19, so long as D.C. continues showing process on the key benchmarks needed to re-open.

Please let me or Joe Koch ( jk@wanada.org) know if you have any questions. All of the federal government and NADA resources mentioned above can be found on  WANADA's COVID-19 Information Library

Sincerely,
  
John O'Donnell
WANADA President and CEO