Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us for this briefing. Mothers day is coming up. Keep those limited celebrations to 10 people or less. When youle, make sure are working, you are working in a socially distanced way. Work from home, if you can. We would ask employers, please continue to have people work at home if it is possible. That is still a good idea, to have people work from home. Please have people do that. Number three, want you to shop once a week. Dont take the family with you when you go shopping. Be efficient, go to the store, get back. Four, help kids socially distanced by keeping them at home to play, avoid group sports, and to make sure that you are avoiding the playground. There has also been some questions about Team Sport Activities. There are no organized Team Sport Activities allowed in nebraska. There has been some confusion about that. Businesses sell memberships and they bring somebody in to do coaching, thats different, but no organized team sports in the month of may. We also, number five, want to help seniors to be able to socially distance. That means you can find opportunities to run errands for them, do their shopping for them so they can stay home. Do not go visit them in a longterm care facility. With mothers day coming up, it will be tough on families. Do not go to those longterm care facilities this weekend. Those facilities cannot allow relatives in. I know you want to see your loved ones but we are still trying to protect that at risk population by keeping them isolated. Help us take care of those folks. As we discussed yesterday, if you look at the number of ofalities in our state, 2 3 them are related back to the longterm care facilities. The reason we are doing all these rules and all the social distancing, the 10 person rule, six feet of distance between people is to make sure we slow the spread of the virus and preserve our Hospital System. We have been successful in doing that. When you look at the hospital data, you will see that we have got 47 of hospital beds icu beds, 43 of available and 75 of ventilators available. We have got that capacity in the Hospital System. The social distancing we have done has worked. Its worked. Continue to keep it up. Nebraska. Com if you havent already. Sign up. It takes less than five minutes. You will be asked a number of questions. It is easy to do. The data is kept totally secure in our database, encrypted, not sold to anybody, not given to law enforcement, just used for this testing program. You can help us get the word out. Lets make this go viral so we can get people signed up all across the state to be able to help take this test. For test soft launch nebraska. Com on monday in omaha and grand island. We have done 730 tests through yesterday. Sorry, 1730 tests through yesterday. We did 465 tests specifically yesterday. Yesterday was 465. 968 tests have come back. 30 have come back positive. For those of you really following along, that is a lower we testge rate than with our highly at risk groups. We are prioritizing Health Care Workers, First Responders, Food Processing, that kind of thing, as well as people that have symptoms. This is a lower rate, but we expected that. We are testing in other areas. Ratepect to have a lower because this is a more general population. Again, we want people to sign up. If you look at our first couple of days, we have had not quite 80 of the test kits turned around in two days or less, which is our goal. Almost 80 . We did have some issues with regards to the procedure we put in place on monday. Some of the tests did not get processed as quickly as we would have liked. I think we are getting the process worked out. We are getting those tests turnaround turned around. We are starting our next mobile testing site today in lincoln at the Lancaster Event Center by appointment only. That is why it is important to sign up at test nebraska. Com. We will be launching lincoln today and lunching skyler on monday launching skyler on monday. Continue to roll these out across the state and expand our Testing Capacity. In general, with regard to Testing Capacity, we have now tested over 1500 tests per day for the last nine days in a row. So just think back a few weeks ago, we were hitting more like 700, 800 tests. Now, we have doubled that. This test nebraska will continue to build upon the number of tests we are doing in the state. I think we just crossed over 40,000 tests. Isnt that right . 40,482 . So over 40,000 tests now. We have ramped up Testing Capacity in the state of nebraska. We have a couple of guests with us today, our director of Veterans Affairs and our director for the department of Administrative Services and my chief Human Resources officer. Memorial day is coming up. Obviously, we know we are still under the 10 person rule. We are not allowing large public gatherings. Day,urse, on memorial nebraskans are very patriotic. We want to recognize our veterans, remember our fallen heroes. We want to be able to recognize the sacrifices the men and women who put on that uniform have made for us. However, this year it is going to be difficult to do that in the ways we have done it in the past with gatherings in the our cemeteries, and so forth. We are not going to be able to do that. The legion post will not be able to do that the way have they have in the past. We want to make sure we are not spreading this virus to these large groups. What we are going to do is a unique event, still make a special memorial day by having broadcasts with the help of john eldred and his team with the help of john and his team, a virtual memorial day recognition so people can participate all across the state. It is one of the ways we are going to be able to help recognize the sacrifices that those men and women have made, their families have made. Remember our fallen heroes, the people who died to be able to give us our freedoms and do in a way that will help slow the spread of the virus, help keep our fellow nebraskans healthy and safe. I want to thank the director for his work to be able to put this together. John, i am going to ask you to come up and talk more about this. Good afternoon. It was not acceptable and certainly legitimate to maintain that justice is that distancing. Whats not acceptable is that we dont reckon is memorial day. We are starting our First Virtual memorial day observance. At 8 00 in the morning in the center of rotunda, here is the vision. You will have a single, very large candle on a candlestick that will represent all of the fallen. Around that candle will be surrounded by flowers and on our behind the candle arc behind the candle will be our flags. You will have guard sentinels, one individual on each side standing guard over this claim flame. The flame is to be lit at 8 00 in the morning. They have agreed to light the flame representing the families of all nebraskans who have lost someone. The flame will continue until 8 00 that night and then it will be extinguished again by the alexanders. The guard sentinels will be changed out, if you will, every 30 minutes throughout the day. In this way i cant hear you when you go over there, just so you know. In this way, all of nebraska can participate, not only virtually, but we are going to have an online signup sheet db, the legion club, vfw, all of those who dab, all of those who participate can send two to their post. That post, coming from anywhere in nebraska, will be able to stand guard over that flag. In this way, we broaden the participation, we keep our numbers well below 10, and at the same time, have that virtual, online event that anyone across actually, the world can tune into and reflect on the sacrifices of our phone service members. All of our veterans homes have annual observances that we are not going to be able to do this year. Almost all the Nursing Homes that i am familiar with have some observance. In this way, you can incorporate this on my visual, if you will will,ine vigil, if you this service into your local and private observances. It has been a very warmly warmlyd been very received. I talked to don. They canceled their event. He said this is great, john. Thanks for supporting this. Also in lancaster county, there is a lot of events going on in lancaster county. They too are supportive of it. We should have some participation from throughout the state. I would encourage as soon as this goes live they will be able to sign up for this. When you signed up, you will get more information about what door to go into and all that. We are very excited about that. The second thing we would like to announce, today we are announcing our virtual Veterans Services officer. On march 23, the United States department of Veterans Affairs, Veterans Benefits Administration Regional Office Closed its doors to public access. Office that is colocated at that facility had to basically start working from home. No more traffic coming in now. What we have done, if you go to our veterans. Nebraska. Gov, our website basically, in the lower righthand corner, you will be able to see an icon. Au can chat in realtime with state Service Officer that is fully accredited. One thing i really like about this chat is that there is a name on who you are talking to and it is a real name. It is not bobby and courtney that generally when you chat online with the different businesses and so forth, they have these generic this is actual names so you can keep track. You can coordinate with the Service Office to upload all of your data, apply for Veterans Benefits, to check the status. We have had this up informally. We have tested it with a few veterans and some u. S. V8 personnel. Usva it should work very well. This is going to post covid nebraska, we are going to start this now. It starts at 8 00 in the morning and ends at 8 00 at night. We are going to go and break that conventional 9 005 00, 8 005 00 Office Hours Monday through friday so that working people, veterans dont have to take Vacation Time to access their benefits. They can go home, have dinner, get online, talk to a state Service Officer. I think we are going to continue after covid. This is one of the ways we are looking forward. Today is may. May 8. 75 years ago today, the german [audio drop] this is your victory, this is your day. Dad brought this back from germany. He was a world war ii veteran so i got that out last night. Today, i am thinking of him and i encourage all nebraskans to think of their Family Member that served in world war ii, their sacrifice, either deployed or at home on the home front. Also tying in with memorial day, the 3000 nebraskans that never came back from world war ii. Thank you, governor, and thank you all. All right. So this is a little risky, john, because we didnt talk about this ahead of time. Im going to test you, quiz you. The last fatality yes. Of the European Campaign was actually nebraskan. I cant remember the name. Too. Am dropping his name, we should have practiced this ahead of time. Thats right. We couldnt go to the ceremony because they had a storm that night, had to drive around. Hopefully, we will get the answer. We are going to do it as a quiz. We will come back at the end of the program. Holden is going to get it for us. Thank you. Holden is going to do it. One of the other things we do here at the state of nebraska eric, do you have it already . The governor has it. Looked have charlie havlick. Thank you very much. His family is from czechoslovakia originally. Thats great. So again, one of the things we try to do here at the state of nebraska is create an environment that is safe, productive, and awesome. We recognize the contributions that her families make. Law in 2017, i signed into a preference to hiring the spouses of military and activeduty military and the state of nebraska, just like we offer that preference to our veterans. Also, we have been working to make the state of nebraska a more friendly place for families throughout Maternity Leave donation program. For example, if you are one of our state teammates, you can leave to unused unexpended an expecting mother so she can take more time off. It is one example of how we have done that. We also have a number of Different Things we are going to be doing to be able to be even more familyfriendly, like extending preferred parking to our expectant mothers, having mothers rooms for nursing mothers. During a Pilot Program with regard to families in the workplace and a number of other things. We thought with mothers day coming up this weekend, it would be a great time for us to announce the programs that we have got and whats going on with regard to how we are making the state of nebraska more familyfriendly. Jason jackson is going to come up and talk more in detail about our programs. Jason, will you please join us . Jason thank you, governor ricketts. As the governor said, it is mothers day, so its appropriate that we acknowledge all of our mothers in State Government. It is exciting to take this opportunity to announce some new initiatives that are going to continue to make nebraska a foremost employer for women and for families. That has been a priority of this administration, as the governor has said. To that end, it is our desire that we make sure that we are coming alongside and supporting all of our teammates as they are starting their families and growing their families. In particular, we know that women make up 54 of our workforce in State Government and face unique challenges when it comes to family formation, childbirth, and returning to the workplace. Within these initiatives, what we are hoping to do is come alongside our parents in State Government, and women in particular, through their Maternity Experience and childbirth experience, and ir return tothe Work Experience so they can continue their careers in Public Service with the support of the state. We have two initiatives we are announcing today. The first is to make sure all state buildings administered by the department of Administrative Services greater than 5000 square feet have nursing mothers rooms. This is a challenge that new moms face as they return to the workforce and if they are nursing, that they be accommodated with a place that is private, has running water, flat surfaces, comfortable seating, refrigeration so that they can go through that nursing experience and be supported while they are returning to the workplace. So thats one of our foremost initiatives that we are announcing today. Secondly, we are enriching our primary wellness and benefits program to reduce the cost of maternity and delivery care by 75 . In the nextward planned year, in our well nebraska plan, families and wills will face moms face an outofpocket maximum of just 500 for maternity and delivery care associated with their growing family. Third, as the governor mentioned, we are starting a preferred Parking Program for expectant and new moms. Can now sign up through the department of Administrative Services to get preferred parking for up to a year after the point at which they sign up to really make it easier on them, in terms of arriving and coming to and from their workplace. And then finally, within the department of Administrative Services specifically, we are announcing a pilot today that will Begin Next Week in which we are calling our babies and our kids at work program. We are going to enable parents to bring their babies and their children into the workplace and work alongside parents as they are returning to the workforce after childbirth. We know that this is another unique challenge that moms, in particular, but families generally face as they contemplate there return to work and continuing their career as their families grow. If that six week mark, when i am leave beingface my exhausted and thinking of the childcare solution for my new baby, we want to accommodate that and allow them to bring the child into the workplace so they can continue their career, get back to work, and just really make it easier for them to contemplate continuing their career and continuing their profession as their families are growing. Again, that will be a pilot. We are excited about how innovative it is but there are other states that have done this. In particular, we have benchmarked with states like washington, arizona, kansas, new hampshire, and several others. We are excited to see what we learn and if there is an opportunity to expanded statewide. Again, collectively, these 4 initiatives represent a continuation of governor ricketts leadership and really trying to make sure the state of nebraska as an employer is familyfriendly, that we support families, moms and dads, and make sure we are a familyfriendly employer and that people can continue their careers in Public Service as their families are starting and growing. With that, i will turn it back over to governor ricketts. Governor ricketts thank you, jason. Number ofhave got a other things we want to hit upon here before we get to questions and answers. First, new guidance coming out. We made the announcement actually, let me take a step back for a second. Changes to our dhm. Dark blue counties are the ones that effective this week, may 4, allows new dhm, which for restaurants to open at 50 capacity, you can have salons and barbershops, parlors, Massage Therapy open backup, the 10 rule restrictions the 10 with the 10 person rule restrictions. M, just be the same dh starting on may 11. And the green counties, we have those that are currently going to meet 31st. One of the things we talked about with those may 31. One of the things we talked about with salons and barbershops is coming up with guidance. There is guidance coming from the state about how they should up or operate. The second thing that relates to that is ppe request. The state is purchasing personal protective equipment. We have talked about how much we have purchased and distributed. We get a lot of questions about this so i thought i would clarify it. We are prioritizing those folks that are in health care or First Responders for that ppe. If you are a facility that is a hospital, a longterm care facility, clinic, Something Like that, that is going to be highpriority. We are also providing ppe to our Public Health department for their use. So anything that is going to be along the lines of that health care, protecting people first, First Responders, lawenforcement, emt, volunteer fire department, all those us are goingting to us are going to get priority with regard to how the state is distributing ppe. [audio drop] governor ricketts we have had folks like salons and folks request ppe but we are not providing those two private institutions outside of the health care industry. We will connect people to be able to find their own but generally, those organizations are going to be responsible for requiring their own acquiring their own ppe. They are going to be responsible for getting their own ppe. The state will not be providing that. The state is providing ppe to those health care, people protecting us, that kind of group of people, but not to private companies who need to acquire their own ppe. Ppp, i want to talk about the payroll protection program, not to be confused with ppe. This is a program from the sba that nebraska was very successful the first time around, our Community Banks working with Small Businesses. Over 80 of our Small Business payroll was covered. We for the number one state in the nation we were the number one state in the nation. That program has run out of money. Congress has put more money into that program. That program is back out there. It is also available for rural hospitals. The sba is doing a webinar on this. So if you are a rural hospital in nebraska, the sba will be doing a webinar. Go to their website and check it out. You will be able to get more information about how you, as a rural hospital, and apply for the Paycheck Protection Program can apply for the Paycheck Protection Program. I think we hit upon all the things i wanted to hit upon and now we go to questions and answers. Ok, aaron. Will the state consider setting up test sites in north and south omaha . First of all, tested nebraska. Com test nebraska. Com is that the cih Health Center arena. We are working on expanding testing as well. We are working on expanding that testing with other sites, as well as working with those two organizations directly about how we can do more testing for communities in north and south omaha, so yes. Second question, why not mandate reporting for meatpacking plants to Public Health officials . I want to take a step back with regard to the Meat Processing facilities. We have had three fatalities in our Food Processing, Meat Processing industry since the beginning of the coronavirus epidemic. ,104 total cases where we have confirmed the prison has tested part the person has tested positive and works and works for the facility. When someone test positive, Employment Information is not necessarily part of what they need to report to get a test. We dont report that information back to the company. Companies dont necessarily know if somebody has tested positive are not. It is up to the person to report that to the company or person report that to our Public Health department. The state is only reporting aggregate data. We are only going to report it aggregate leak across the state and not for individual facilities. Guess what . Sometimes, people dont tell the truth. Other cases where people have tested positive and did not say that they worked for a company when they did. What we are releasing is aggregate data for Industries Like our Food Processing industry, longterm care facilities, but we are not going to release it on a per company basis from the state standpoint. We have issued guidance to Public Health departments if they want to do that. Confirmy want to do is a person works for the company. Laws, because of the hipaa , when we get somebody testing positive, we contact the local Public Health department so they can do contact tracing. We dont tell the company the information. Companies dont do it. We can mend cant mandate Companies Report that because they dont have that information because they are not part of that information chain. I think there is a misunderstanding about how this process works. The Public Health department is doing the contact tracing, not the company. Is held ating private venues, are gatherings of more than 10 people permissible . The answer is no. The 10 person rule is the 10 person rule for any gathering in the state of nebraska, unless we make a specific exception like for houses of worship. What about rotating people in and out of say no more than 10 people that are there at one time . Again, if you have got a private venue and your rotating people in and out, i suppose technically that is within the letter of the law but it is not the spirit of the law. When you are rotating people in and out, you are creating more opportunity for the virus to spread. That is not something we would recommend. Do you feel we have peaked in the state . If not, are there other thoughts of when the state might peak . The models have changed constantly. One of the models a lot of people looked at is the Washington State model. I have looked at that model from time to time as well. At one point, it showed we were going to peak april 23. Now, i think it has moved back to may. Those models keep changing. They are not very good. Models are not really predictive. I dont really think about it when the case is peak so much as much as what is happening to the Hospital System. Making sure we have got that Hospital Capacity in our Hospital System to be able to take care of people when they seek hospital help. That is what we are focused on. That doesnt change whether or not somebody test positive are not. If you are sick enough to go to the hospital, you are going to go to the hospital, whether you think you have the coronavirus or not, whether you test positive or not. That is a concrete number we know does not change with testing. People are sick or not and they go to the hospital. That is a really good, concrete measure that we can look at that will tell us how the Hospital System is doing, which is really the goal of what we are trying to accomplish, is keep the Hospital System available for everybody who needs it. Testing, on the other hand, is a variable that changes all the time based on how many people we test and it changes on who we test. When we are testing less symptomatic people, we get lower test rates. 3 of the people testing positive. When we test highrisk populations, we can get much higher percentage of people testing positive, like what we saw in lexington when we had 30 or 40 of people test positive. You can change that variable based upon who you test. You can change the number of cases that you get based on how may people you test, right . The more tests we do, the more tests we are going to get come back positive. That is not the only reason why we are getting more cases test positive but that is one of the reasons why when we test more, we are going to get more people who test positive, so we are going to see our cases go up. We could Start Testing and our case count would drop to zero but that would not change the fact that the virus is still spreading in our state. You can see case count is not necessarily a good thing to measure. If you stop testing, you get zero cases but we still know that the virus would be spreading in our state so that is not really reflecting reality either. That is why looking at case counts by themselves is not helpful to look at, especially when our big focus is about how we are protecting and preserving the Health Care System. Thats what we really care about. When asked about new daily highs , earlier this week you twice cited increased testing. Are you suggesting a substantial increase in cases we have seen are merely a function of increased testing . No, i am not saying it is merely a function but it is a correlation. The more you test, the more you will get positive tests back. Should people in nebraska be concerned to see new daily highs right as we are beginning to reopen . I want to go back to our analogy of the speed limit. Deathsd end nearly all on the interstate highway system if we took the speed limit down to five Miles Per Hour but we dont do that. Essentially, we have done that for our society by all the restrictions we put in place. Now, we did that for a good reason, right . We wanted to make sure that the Health Care System did not get overwhelmed. We did not know how this was all [audio drop] so it totally worked and everybody needed that hospital bed or ventilator was able to get it. Now what we see is we have plenty of capacity in our Health Care System and figure out what is that speed to allow people to return to a more normal life and were only slowing the spread of the virus in the state. We cant stop it but slow the spread. Weve done that. Now were trying to see what sort of restrictions can we loosen so we can allow people to get back to a more normal way of life. Thats what were in the phase now, starting to loosen the restrictions like we started may 4 and what weve done with elective surgeries, worship services, allowing restaurants to go to 50 capacity. These are all steps along the way of slowly releasing some of these restrictions so we can get back to a more normal way of life. Well be managing this virus a long time, the balance of this year, until theres a vaccine that works and theres no guarantee that will happen so we have to focus on managing this virus which means we have to take these social distancing measures and well continue doing this throughout the course of the rest of the year so weve got to figure out what is the right speed to manage that within our state and what were working on right now. Were focusing on what is the best speed. Well continue to focus on the Health Care System and make sure thats available as that benchmark, so that variable does not change whether or not were testing or not. Has there been any steps to help polling sites tuesday with an era of shortage . The secretary of state has done a number of scenario plannings the National Guard has been included, some of those alternatives. Everything has been discussed and is on the table. So weve done a number of scenario plannings. Aylor . What is the schedule for opening wanting to know what the time line is for opening swimming pools. Ive had a number of discussions with our mayors and board chairs across the state with regard to swimming pools. The state will be coming out with guidelines with regard to that. Later this month we want to see how this month goes along and have some idea about the data as we talk about how those swimming pools might start reopening. For the time being we know a lot of the pools open memorial day. 10person rule if youre going to do it. No more than 10 people there at any one given time. As i talk about that rule, most mayors say it probably doesnt make it worthwhile to open those pools and i certainly endorse that. Weve got to think about how many people and we have the 10 person rule limit, could that be relaxed in june . It might be and then would apply to pools as well but theres not a specific guideline when pools can reopen. I would say stay tuned as we get more data, the state will have guidelines with regard to that. Wed like to know about the lodging program, our College Dorms being used and has it been offered . Wants to know are College Dorms being used for lodging and who is using them and and are Food Processing users allowed to use them . Yes to all those. Starting today university of nebraska will be available and u. N. K. And i believe doctor, do you have the numbers on hand . One person at u. N. K. And nobody at u. N. L. Because we opened u. N. O. Up to 24 and i know we have 43 thats actually, i think we have Food Processors are 43. The people allowed to go back the answer is yes, were using, for example, hotels for our Meat Processing workers who are going back and forth to work so we have 43 of those folks in hotels and our First Responders using some of the hotels around the state as well. Wants to know [inaudible question] wants to know if i think husker football will be unlikely this fall . I would say that i think it is something that we should start taking a look at. I know this is going to be a conversation im not going to be directly involved with but ncaa, the university of nebraska. But i think under certain conditions we could see husker football this fall. That may mean the season is delayed and certainly not going to look the same way as last year and not like the old Football Games but could there be fans participating in a way . Yeah, i think there could. Could everybody be Wearing Masks and that sort of thing . Yes, i think theres an opportunity to make that happen but a lot will depend what the ncaa wants to do and it may not be every school. For example, i can imagine rutgers in new jersey will have a lot harder time than we will in nebraska. Paul wants to know if you have any response [inaudible question] so paul hammill wants to know if i have any reaction to rachel mad how saying we hadnt released information. She hasnt been watching our press conferences because i released information about the Food Processors yesterday. Shes wrong and has her own agenda. Thats about it. [inaudible question] paul wants to know why correction officers dont have n95 masks. Again, we are masking folks in our facilities. They have p. P. E. And doing that as part of our Overall Program and i think that part of the n95 masks, its difficult to do their jobs in those because its heavier and i think we have the regular ill have to have the doctor talk about the surgical mask but the n95 masks are difficult to do really heavy physical work in. Why dont we get the doctor to get a direct answer on that. Wants to know testing, are we ever going to get everyone who wants a test get a test multiple times in a month . Wants to know with regard to testing will we get to the point anybody who wants a test will get a test multiple times a month . That is one of the possibilities we may have down the road and will depend how Testing Capacity ramps up across the nation in regard to reagents and the testing materials we do. Right now we have a lot of capacity in the state of nebraska. People need to sign up, testnebraska. Com and we have lots of capacity to do testing. Have people sign up and get scheduled and get in. We have lots of capacity. We have time for a couple questions with the local Health Care Workers as well. Im late. Lets take a couple questions rom the audience here. [inaudible question] hard to do the typical Memorial Day Service for their families and things, can you talk about how difficult it is for folks to perform their normal agendas and people be able to watch and participate spp participate . Its monday, may 25 and two weeks out and we have time to please sign up for army guard members that like to be sentinels. No, i think this whole thing is difficult. Its difficult when you miss a birthday or difficult when you cant go to a religious ceremony. I think its difficult when you cant graduate from high school. My son is graduating from the university of nebraska tomorrow. I think thats difficult. One of the things that we do is we try to do what we can and in this situation, with memorial day as a state observance, we were able to do something. So this is what we were able to do and i think its something very valid and i think it not replace because its something very different but will fill a need. At any time during the day youll be able to see this that this presentation is being guarded and honored and the flame lit by the gold star family and youll take time out of your day to do what you normally do on memorial days, remember the fallen. That fills a need but something we can do. But this is one of many things people are having difficulty with but our department of Veterans Affairs wanted to tep up and do what we can. Thank you, john. Martha, go ahead. Governor, what are you doing to to look at the state budget and are there any instructions to the state agencies about what they should given the uncertaintys with the revenue the state will have . The question is what are we doing about our state budget and uncertainties with regard to what revenues will look like . Were starting to make preparations with regard to what are we doing to make sure were being able to continue to provide our services and constrain our spending and so forth . Some of it again well have to see what happens over the course of the next couple months. For example, the revenues we had for march were released in mid april. Those didnt reflect the full impact of what happened. Well have another release of revenues here in about a week or so that will have april numbers and give us a little bit more information. Part of it s martha, before we can make specific plan is get a couple more months under our belt to see what the impacts to our revenue will be. We know there will be an impact and we know 330 million in payments got moved from april to july and will impact our cash flow and impacts what will happen this fiscal year. But i remind people going through march we were about 296 million ahead of forecast from the forecast that was set last july. So last july we set a forecast and what we used for the twoyear planning cycle and so forth and was the certificate fight forecast and 290 million ahead of that forecast going through march and we had a healthy cash reserve and healthy cash ballots. I think our cash reserve in march our cash balance, thinking like that with our checking account, 583 million. Our cash reserve is at 488 million. So we had over a billion dollars in cash available to us because we were running ahead of our forecast. In part because of our forecast. Were in a very Strong Financial position and want to see what will happen the next couple months but youre absolutely right, well have to be doing planning with regard to what expenses while be constraining and impacting to the new impact of what the budget will be but we dont have a good idea what that is yet. One last question . Do you attribute the lower positive rate from test nebraska entirely to geography . Do we attribute the lower than the test positive being roughly 3 lower than what weve been testing to geography . The geography is omaha and grand island and one of the groups we prioritize Health Care Workers, First Responders, Food Processors and so forth but not necessarily people who are symptomatic. People who work with people may have been exposed to the virus but not showing symptoms. I think thats the reason were seeing a lower percent of positive rate. Are you saying theres different priorities for test nebraska than the other testing going on . Right, right, thats exactly right, fred. For example with test nebraska we said were going to test First Responders, Health Care Workers, Food Processors, law enforcement, as a priority. The groups of people keeping us safe and highly stomach people and stomach people and so forth. In other areas weve tested high risk groups there we have lots of spread of the virus than those who signed up in the omaha area to get that test. They are testing different groups and why i say looking at percent positives is a key indicators when you may have spreading in your community but cannot be a great thing because depending who you test youll get different sets of positives and test incredible shows 3 positive versus the other places ill use lexington as an example when we Start Testing positive there and get 30 positive there. Again, who you test makes a difference on the percent positive so if youre testing people who are not symptomatic, youll get people who generally test less positive. Do we have enough tests for he people in the group that you were testing the ones with the symptoms, the 30 . In that group weve been testing 1,500 tests a day which is up double where it was a few weeks ago. Weve greatly expanded that testing as well. Not only are we expanding with test nebraska but our Current Program of how we were testing people, too. [inaudible question] weve got lots of capacity in the system, martha. Well continue to expand capacity but were able to do the testing were doing and expand testing as well. All right, folks. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Want to say happy mothers day to all the mothers out there and the nebraska working to slow the progress and have a happy weekend. See you next week. Thank you. Cspans washington journal live every day with policy and issues that impact you today. Coming up this morning were taking calls and questions from High Schoolers across the country preparing to take the advanced placement u. S. History and government exam with High School History teacher jason stacy and Matthew Ellington and coauthors of the book fabric of a nation and history teach ers from Stevenson High School in illinois. Watch live at 7 30 and join the discussion. President trump and the first lady arrived at a wreath laying ceremony at the world war ii memorial in washington, d. C. To mark the 75th anniversary of victory in europe day and the surrender of nazi germany to allied forces
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