Tables are stacked up to discourage patrons from dining-in at the Broad Street Market in Harrisburg on Thursday, March 19, 2020. Governor Tom Wolf has banned on-site service for bars and restaurants to help slow the spread of the new coronavirus.
Rachel McDevitt / WITF
Rachel McDevitt / WITF
Tables are stacked up to discourage patrons from dining-in at the Broad Street Market in Harrisburg on Thursday, March 19, 2020. Governor Tom Wolf has banned on-site service for bars and restaurants to help slow the spread of the new coronavirus.
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(Harrisburg) — Gov. Tom Wolf announced Monday that all schools will remain closed indefinitely as Pennsylvania reported nearly 700 new cases of the coronavirus.
Wolf also extended his order to stay at home to more counties — Carbon, Cumberland, Dauphin and Schuylkill — and said the social distancing guidelines will be extended until April 30.
“We’re going to keep our schools and businesses closed as long as we need to keep them closed to keep Pennsylvania safe. Right now, it isn’t safe,” he said.
Under Wolf’s order, people in the 26 affected counties may leave their homes to work at a business that’s still open, go to the grocery store or pharmacy, visit a doctor, care for a relative, get outside to exercise or for several other reasons.
More developments:
COVID-19 cases reported by the state Health Department on Monday rose by 693 to nearly 4,100. There were 10 new deaths, bringing Pennsylvania’s total to 48. The agency initially reported 11 new deaths Monday but later revised the number.
There are 388 total cases in central Pennsylvania counties: Adams (8), Berks (82), Columbia (6), Cumberland (24, including 1 death), Dauphin (36), Franklin (12), Juniata (3), Lancaster (97, including 2 deaths), Lebanon (27), Mifflin (1), Northumberland (1), Perry (1), Schuylkill (30), Snyder (2), Union (4) and York (54).
Officials said those diagnosed are hospitalized or in isolation.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear up in a couple of weeks. Older adults and people with existing health problems are at higher risk of more severe illness, including pneumonia, or death.
You can rely on WITF during emergency situations, but also when news seems a little less urgent. We’re here to keep you informed. Learn more about our editorial process and connect with our journalists.
The Department of Corrections said inmates throughout the state prison system will largely be confined to their cells to keep the virus from spreading after an inmate at State Correctional Institution at Phoenix in Montgomery County tested positive for COVID-19.
Commonwealth Media Services
The area where the inmate lived at SCI Phoenix has been placed under quarantine, officials said.
“Quarantining the entire system is in the best interest of our employees and our inmates,” Corrections Secretary John Wetzel said in a news release.
Inmates will only be allowed out of their cells for video visits, phone calls and access to the law library.
The Corrections Department incarcerates nearly 44,600 inmates in 25 state prisons.
Meanwhile, the state Supreme Court was asked Monday to order the release of some inmates from county jails to help reduce the virus’s spread. The county jail system isn’t impacted by the Department of Corrections quarantine.
A petition filed with the state’s high court by the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania said tight inmate quarters, a lack of sanitation, and a limited ability to treat and quarantine people suspected of having COVID-19 presents an “extraordinary public health risk” to inmates, staff and surrounding communities.
Once the virus enters a jail, it’s “virtually certain to spread like wildfire,” the petition said.
Ian Sterling / WITF
The Pennsylvania Judicial Center in Harrisburg.
The ACLU asked the Supreme Court to order the release of inmates at high risk of serious illness from COVID-19, and those nearing the end of their sentences, eligible for work release or held on cash bail before trial.
The plaintiffs are the Pennsylvania Prison Society, an advocacy group, along with five inmates. The ACLU asked for “extraordinary relief” under what’s called “king’s bench” jurisdiction, which gives the high court power to take up a case immediately, rather than wait for it to work its way through the lower courts.
ACLU of Pennsylvania legal director Vic Walczak said social distancing in jails is impossible.
“You’ve got people who are double- and triple-celled,” he said. “In many of these jails, people are held 30, 40, 60 folks to a large room where they all sleep, eat, and use the bathroom together.”
Other states, including New Jersey, have taken steps to reduce their jail populations, as have Allegheny, Lackawanna and Lancaster counties in Pennsylvania.
The legal action was taken as Pike County officials announced Sunday that a staffer at the jail tested positive for COVID-19. Inmates who had direct contact are under quarantine.
Matt Rourke / AP Photo
FILE PHOTO: This Nov. 29, 2018, file photo shows a Wells Fargo bank location in Philadelphia.
The Pennsylvania attorney general’s office is seeking banks and financial institutions to join a new program that expands consumer protections under a recently passed federal law.
Under the program, dubbed PA CARE Package, lending institutions will make loans more easily available to small- and medium-sized businesses and will provide a 90-day grace period for mortgages; auto and other consumer loans; and late and overdraft fees and similar charges.
Participating banks must also agree to a minimum two-month moratorium on foreclosures, evictions and vehicle repossessions, and promise not to negatively impact the credit of people who get relief from consumer loans.
The attorney general’s office said PNC Bank was the first to agree to participate.
Pennsylvania set another record for unemployment filings last week, surpassing 400,000, as businesses shut down and laid off workers to slow the spread of the virus.
Daily figures posted by Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration showed 405,000 unemployment compensation benefits filings in the seven days through Saturday. That beat the record set a week earlier at 379,000, which itself was highest in the nation and twice the number of the nearest state.
Unemployment filings surged after Wolf on March 16 asked nonessential businesses statewide to close their physical locations, and later mandated it. Schools are closed through at least April 9.
The emergency relief bill signed last week by President Donald Trump adds 13 weeks of benefits — from 26 to 39 in Pennsylvania — plus $600 a week in benefits. It also expands eligibility to workers who don’t pay into the system and normally aren’t eligible, but who lost jobs due to the virus pandemic.
Katie Blackley / WESA
Swings sit empty in Pittsburgh’s Arsenal Park on Monday, March 23, 2020.
Pittsburgh is closing its public basketball courts and overlooks because too many people are crowding them and flouting social distancing guidelines.
The city announced Monday that parks department employees are removing basketball hoops from city parks and closing Mount Washington overlooks.
Additionally, police will patrol city parks to break up soccer games and other group sports that have been banned during the pandemic.
The parks remain open, and city officials encouraged residents to use them to get exercise — as long as they stay away from each other.
The city also warned parents taking children to shuttered playgrounds that the equipment might not be safe because the virus can live on surfaces for several days.
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Rubinkam reported from northeastern Pennsylvania and Lauer reported from Philadelphia.
WESA’s An-Li Herring contributed to this story.
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