I'm in education, and kids going back to school in person is just as a contentious issue. But one of the unions put it pretty succinctly... they asked (paraphrased here), "What is an acceptable numbers of deaths that can occur if schools reopen?"
Yeah, I get it, people can die from all sorts of things. What makes this different is: 1) it's highly, highly contagious and can be easily passed to lots of people, and 2) it's essentially preventable with simple guidelines.
A certain person from another website that shall remain nameless said that the death rate in CA is 0.043%, which is practically zero; ergo, just open the parks. But considering that CA has a population of 39.51 million, if you do the math, that's 17,000 people who have died needlessly. Is that really acceptable?
Don't get me wrong, I'm disappointed Newsom went with the Yellow tier as well. Personally, I feel Orange Tier and park modifications/caps would have been sufficient. But CA is about 12% of the entire population of the United States (based on 39.5 million in CA and 328.2 million for the USA). With so many people in one state, and a potential for things to spread out of control rapidly, it's smart to stay cautious. My heart continuous to go out to all those who are out of work in the industry, but the risk of so many other unecessary deaths and possible lifelong health risks (as Alicia noted) shouldn't be taken lightly.