SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Friday marks the first day that Sacramento County is back to the "purple tier" with tougher coronavirus restrictions in place. That means restaurants, bars, and gyms had to make some difficult adjustments, once again.
"It seems like everything, the cold, the rain, everything affects the restaurant business," Pauline Jimenez, owner of Ernesto's Mexican Food said.
Restaurants are forced to move all tables outside, once again, and rely solely on outdoor dining and to-go orders only.
"I was a little disappointed, to say the least because like I said, we're just barely trying to crawl and here we are going back," Jimenez said.
Jimenez said their 29th anniversary is coming up on Wednesday, Nov, 18. But they can't celebrate it the way they normally would, with a house packed full of regular customers.
"How do you pay the bills? You don't pay the bills with three or four tables at a time, so it's very hard" she said.
Instead, they'll be seating every other table on their patio which is luckily covered and they do have some heaters already set up.
"I really feel sorry for the restaurants because it's just killing them," customer Perry McGuigan said.
But restaurants aren't the only ones being told to make changes.
"It's definitely frustration and fear of losing my own business," Michael Ortega, owner of HIIT Fitness in East Sacramento said.
All gyms, like HIIT Fitness, which has already taken about a 60% drop in revenue, are being asked to close their doors, again, and take their workouts outside.
"We'll do what we can and we'll survive. We'll do what's necessary, but it's not easy. It's not comfortable. And, do people want to work out in the rain? No!" Ortega said. "So yeah, it gives us very few options."
But Ortega said gyms are meant to serve as an outlet for people.
"They need it emotionally, obviously physically, for the health aspect of it. But the mindset, the mental health of it, being home a lot, dealing with changes for everyone, this is the outlet that I think needs to be in place," he said.
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