Indoor dining may be on Reopening Task Force table soon; Rochester cases at 9

CONCORD - Gov. Chris Sununu gave state restaurateurs a ray of hope on Monday when he hinted that inside dining is on his radar.

Asked by The Rochester Voice why a church can be open at 40 percent capacity but a restaurant can't, the governor paused before hinting that eateries flexing open to allow indoor service might not be off the table too much longer.

"Hopefully we'll be able to take another step in the near future," he said.

The governor insisted, however, churches and restaurants "are different" but didn't go into any explanation regarding the respective social distancing metrics.

Meanwhile, state epidemiologist Benjamin Chan announced 39 new positive tests for COVID-19, with five new hospitalizations and no new deaths.

He said so far some 74,000 Granite Staters have been tested with an average of 1,800 daily tests performed. He said numbers of positive cases on a daily basis continue at between 4 and 5 percent, which is good.

DHHS Commissioner Lori Shibinette said she had about 130 contact tracers working on some 4,000 Granite Staters being monitored or quarantined after having tested positive for COVID-19.

She encouraged everybody to get tested.

Locally, Emergency Operations Center Chief Mark Klose reported on Monday they had nine current cases in Rochester.