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Outdoor dining is one of several activities allowed to resume under the county's amended order, which will take effect Friday (June 5). The easing of the shelter-in-place restrictions are credited to progress made in containing and preventing cases of COVID-19 in Santa Clara County.

Effective Friday (June 5), in-store retail, outdoor dining, all manufacturing, small service businesses, child care and summer programs, and religious, cultural and civic activities will be allowed to resume operating under an amended version of Santa Clara County’s shelter-in-place order.

Megan V. Winslow

A sign in the window of Eco-Fash notifies customers of the downtown Los Altos thrift shop’s temporary closure due to the coronavirus pandemic. Starting Friday, retail businesses will be allowed to offer curbside pickup.

Santa Clara County’s fourth round of changes to its shelter-in-place order allows several businesses and activities to make a comeback, with limitations, county leaders announced today (May 18).

Note: This story has been updated to correct errors in the original story related to Yamagami's Nursery.

Conflicting shelter-in-place orders between Santa Clara County and the state have left local businesses confused over how – or if – they can operate.

Santa Clara County plans to open two COVID-19 testing sites this week in underserved areas – one at James Lick High School in San Jose and the other at Christopher High School in Gilroy.

“As much as we’ve had a bottleneck throughout the nation on testing, this is a big day,” said county Supervisor David Cortese. “This is a sign of things to come.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s drive to open 80 testing sites statewide reached the county with the introduction of the sites. Operated by OptumServe, the sites will provide tests to residents of the surrounding neighborhoods with COVID-19 symptoms. The service is free to all, including those without insurance or permanent citizenship status.

Megan V. Winslow/Town Crier

A healthcare professional gathers medical information during a COVID-19 test in the parking lot of a private  practice near El Camino Hospital April 10.

Acting on a hunch, staff at the Santa Clara County Medical Examiner’s Office kept post-mortem samples of three residents whose autopsy results yielded more questions. Their persistence proved paramount in a new discovery about the coronavirus in the region: It’s been transmitting longer than experts thought, health officer Dr. Sara Cody said at a press briefing Wednesday (April 22).

Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian held the first of three scheduled “telephone town halls” April 5, fielding questions from among the thousands of listeners from Los Altos to Los Gatos about local and national response to the coronavirus crisis.