Jonathan's list of precondtions for reopening - basically, lots of quick cheap testing, easy availability of hand sanitizer, temperature monitors at doors, strict contact-tracing regime - is pretty much what I'd worked out for myself, since I don't think we can really manage shelter-in-place for 18 months.  

BACDS sponsors dances and performance teams all over the main San Francisco Bay Area and dance camps and weekends even a bit further away (Monterey Bay, wine country).  My impression is that most CDSS-affiliate dance organizations run a series or a team or a ball or a weekend.  We do it all, and revenues from the various activities backstop each other, so we're usually pretty resilient, and we have enough money in the bank that even if a camp completely tanks the organizers don't have to reach into their personal pockets.  

BACDS usually books in calendar quarters (we've got something like 19 series (biweekly or monthly, some take summers off) canceled the camps and weekends in July-September and told all our series programmers not to book for July-September.  We're moving tentatively forward with a November ECD weekend (but I'm not investing too heavily in it emotionally because of the strong chance of a resurgence of the virus in Fall.)  For restarting the dance series - well, the Board will monitor the situation, but since our dances are run by volunteers, etc, we need the halls, the board (who authorize the rent checks), and the series organizers all to agree that it's safe to restart.

BACDS is luckily not under a lot of financial pressure, but some of our musicians definitely are. (I've personally been on CDbaby and Kickstarter binges to get some money toward trad freelancers.)  I set up a web page on the organization which is supposed to be a place for links from BACDS-affiliated musicians for CD sales, lesson reservations, online concerts, etc, but I can't chase all that up myself and so far I've had *zero* uptake - nobody's sent me any links to put up.  I'm probably going to replace that page with a redirect to the CDSS freelancers page.

I do worry, a lot, about whether people who will rent halls to us will still have those halls to rent after a few months with no revenue for mortgage payments, etc.  Some of the churches we rent from are kinda marginal, and fraternal organizations seem like they skew old-and-at-risk.  When canceling our dances for months we left our rent money with the halls as a kind of reservation for after the emergency, but I don't think that really guarantees that our contra dances will have a place to meet next Spring if a socially-distanced AA meeting is able to take that space in August.  We'll have to work it out when we get there.

I edit a weekly calendar email for BACDS events and I've switched over to aggregating links of online activities once a week.  One of our members with a Zoom account has organized a weekly series of online checkins via Zoom; I co-hosted the one last night.  (Everybody who wants to speaks briefly about how they're doing this week, there's some general conversation, people can drop in or out.)  It's nice to see people's faces.  One of the people last night talked about how interesting it was to get to know dancers in a different way - at least to learn their names, hear what they're doing for fun, etc.  [I was merely co-moderating, had never attended an online check-in before, and the realy host did most of the moderating work; it was still surprisingly tiring to keep things moving, try to shut down extensive monologues, etc.]  On the one hand, this seems good for community cohesion; on the other, of the 400+ peple on the email list, about 30 checked in the first meeting and 14 in the second.  I did sent out a separate email for the checkin as well as including it in the calendar, but I figure I'm not going to be flooding email boxes with maybe two messages a week.

-- Alan
From: Jonathan Roveto via Organizers <organizers@lists.sharedweight.net>
Sent: Thursday, April 9, 2020 7:37 AM
To: Lisa Sieverts <lisa@lisasieverts.com>
Cc: A list for dance organizers <organizers@sharedweight.net>
Subject: [Organizers] Re: It might be a long time until we dance again
 
I think waiting for a vaccine is overkill. At some point, you have to let people make up their own minds. There will be a few things to consider: 1) At some point, restaurants, sporting events, and schools will all start back up again. 2) Mass testing and antibody testing will become active. 3) Hopefully some treatments will present statistically significant efficacy. 4) Staying cooped up and without socialization are already resulting in increased suicide rates and are generally unhealthy in the first place.

What 1) means is that people will start coming in contact with people again, even if it means in the background of at-the-door temperature checks, abundant hand sanitizer, etc., and our dances wouldn't be the only risk factor in one's life by far. 2) means that we will be able to make far more knowledgeable decisions on who should go out. It also means that if you do feel sick, you'd be able to get tested and treated early. You'd also be able to know if you're already immune. 3) , especially in conjunction with 2), means that covid-19 becomes less fatal. There are I think something like 300 clinical trials in progress looking for treatments. Some are garbage, but others are showing promise. 4) means that there is pressure from the other end saying that at some point, the danger posed by socializing becomes lower than the danger posed by continued isolation.

While I don't think those will all come at the same time or in quick succession, I think they'll all be true before a vaccine is approved for use in the US. I think 1) is two to three months away, 2) is probably two months away, 3) could be realized by the end of this month (albeit production capabilities would need to ramp up), and 4) is beyond my knowledge base. The kicker, in my mind, is that that means potentially dancing in August? But then it's likely that we'll see a resurgence in fall again, and we'll see if our capabilities mean we go on lockdown again or do the S. Korea approaches of widespread, aggressive testing with contact tracing.

Jonathan Roveto
Owner/Member
Fair Oaks Holdings, LLC
Cell: (559) 961-7497
PO Box 684492
Marietta, GA 30068


On Thu, Apr 9, 2020 at 9:22 AM Lisa Sieverts via Organizers <organizers@lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
Organizers, what are your plans for restarting your dances?

I had a conversation with a smart person the other day, who said “we
probably can’t dance again until there is a vaccine for this corona
virus.” And that might be 12-18 months away.

If that’s the case, what should our organizations be doing during that
period of time? And how many dances just won’t restart?

What conversations are you having within your organizations?

Thank you,
Lisa
Monadnock Folklore Society

Lisa Sieverts
603-762-0235
lisa@lisasieverts.com
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