[Alberta's Child]

I don’t think the process was as arbitrary as it’s made out to be. The governor basically decided NOT to do this on a county-by-county basis, but instead aggregated groups of counties into large regions of Pennsylvania. The counties that have been upgraded to the “Yellow” stage are simply those in the northwestern quadrant of the state.

[BlackAdderess]

You’re right it is regional rather than county level. Still you have a big swathe running north/south that isn’t bad at all. The bad spots are anything close to Philly, Pittsburgh, I-95, I-83.

[Vigilanteman]

Not entirely true. He announced a yellow reopening for the SW Pennsylvania counties on Friday but kept one of that group (Butler) red, citing a higher number of WuFlu deaths, almost entirely at one nursing home which he mandated take Covid-19 patients while specially prepared hospital wards went largely unused.

The Butler County prosecutor promptly announced that no prosecutions would be made against businesses which opened early. Our own prosecutor (Westmoreland County) and a Democrat, by the way, followed with a similar announcement.

Social distancing is much easier to maintain when everyone isn't gathered in the parking lots of the big box stores like Wally World.

[IrishBrigade]

‘but instead aggregated groups of counties into large regions of Pennsylvania.’

yes, and he ‘aggregated’ rural-suburban Lancaster County into the Greater Metro Philly region; we may get to the yellow phase by September...another thing killing Lancaster are the inordinate number of ‘retirement communities’ being contructed; 80 acres of woodland right next to my property were ripped out to put in one of these $%#&ing atrocities...