Baker County officials want to let some businesses reopen soon. And they say they’ve got a plan to do it safely.

A collection of local leaders, including county commissioners, health officials and hospital administrators, submitted a 14-page proposal to Gov. Kate Brown this week. Officials didn’t release the proposal and couldn’t immediately be reached to produce it.

The effort calls for the creation of an incident command board that includes a business and medical case review unit to implement “an information-based, phased approach to reopening.”

Officials expect the governor’s office to offer revisions.

“However, we know how important it is to our community as a whole to be able to reopen, and we assure you this is our highest priority,” County Commissioner Mark Bennett said. “Moving forward will probably be slower than anyone would like to see, but we recognize we’ll need to approach reopening thoughtfully but steadily to avoid having to start over.”

Officials said their slice of eastern Oregon is ready to begin easing on restrictions on businesses because Baker County has not seen a single confirmed case of COVID-19, visits to medical facilities from patients exhibiting coronavirus-like symptoms are on the decline and that it has enough personal protective equipment and surge capacity in its hospital.

So far, five of Oregon’s 36 counties have not yet registered a confirmed case of COVID-19, all of them east of the Cascades: Baker, Gilliam, Harney, Lake and Wheeler.

Officials in several of those counties, including Baker, submitted letters to Brown earlier this month signaling they’d like to begin allowing certain businesses to open starting May 1.

Both business leaders and public officials say smaller populations in many of rural Oregon’s counties will make the eventual economic recovery more difficult.

--Eder Campuzano | 503-221-4344 | @edercampuzano

Eder is The Oregonian’s education reporter. Do you have a tip about Portland Public Schools? Email ecampuzano@oregonian.com.

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