We are saddened by the article that the Sacramento Bee ran yesterday morning about our Swap Meet this coming weekend, without reaching out for input from us, the Placer County Health Department or the Placer County Fairgrounds. This initial article is what other media locally have picked up and run. Our Swap Meet has been planned since October 2020, and has been publicly announced since then. We worked with the Placer County Health Department, and Placer County Fairgrounds to run this Swap Meet safely and within parameters, as we did last September and October at the same Event Center. We offered to work with the Placer County Health Department so that they could continue their vaccinations, but they had already been aware of the closure and had made adjustments accordingly, extending their hours this Monday-Wednesday instead.
Even if the Swap Meet was postponed now, the Placer County Health Department has already allocated any vaccines that they would have distributed on Thursday & Friday to their extended hours Monday to Wednesday, they have informed us.
We encourage you to read the statements included below from both the Placer County Health Department and Placer County Fairgrounds, both sent to Fox 40 today who reached out to all parties involved.
Placer County Health Department – “The clinic will be closed April 1-2. We’ve known that the Grounds had a prior commitment on those dates for some time, and so we were able to plan ahead and extend our clinic hours from Monday through Wednesday to compensate and continue to maximize our volume. The majority of appointments this week are second rather than first doses (about 4800 second, 550 first). Folks getting their second dose can schedule it up to four days before their second dose eligibility date (per CDC), and for weeks afterward, so we don’t anticipate any issues or impacts to needed appointments. We will be tearing down our setup (chairs, tables, other equipment) and will return after the building is cleared.”
Placer Valley Fairgrounds- “The Placer County-operated COVID-19 vaccine clinic located
@The Grounds will extend hours and operate 9:30 a.m. to 5:30p.m. today (Monday, March 29) through Wednesday (March 31) in order to accommodate residents seeking their first or second shot of the vaccination.
The clinic – which has already distributed more than 50,000 vaccinations and helped Placer County reach the highest vaccination rate in the Sacramento region – will not operate Thursday (April 1) and Friday (April 2) because of an event that had been planned
@The Grounds since mid-2020. Placer County health officials knew about the scheduled event and added three hours per day to vaccinate residents today through Wednesday, and had already planned to be closed Thursday and Friday.
The county-run COVID vaccination clinic is typically closed on weekends. The clinic will resume vaccinations 9 a.m. Monday, April 5.
Last Thursday (March 25), Governor Gavin Newsom announced individuals at least 50 years old would be eligible to make an appointment starting Thursday, April 1. Those at least 16 years are eligible to make an appointment to be vaccinated starting April 15.
We are extremely happy and proud to serve the community with the ongoing vaccination clinic, and play a major role in combating the spread of COVID,” said Charlie Gardner, General Manager of
@The Grounds, formerly the Placer County Fairgrounds. “We’ve adjusted the clinic schedule to help accommodate those seeking vaccinations, while also meeting a long-standing agreement with an event organizer.”
SacAnime, a swap meet between vendors and anime fans, will be held Friday through Saturday
@The Grounds. SacAnime, like all events
@The Grounds during the pandemic, will follow health and safety protocols, including limiting attendance and requiring face masks.
The Roebbelen Center located
@The Grounds – able to accommodate as many as 12 full-length basketball courts or 24 volleyball courts – opened in February 2020. The 160,000-square-foot building was designed to attract major sports competitions, large meetings, trade shows, concerts and other events to the region. But five weeks after the grand-opening celebration of the building, the state-ordered lockdown went into place to prevent the spread of COVID.
Soon after,
@The Grounds and the Robbelen Center in partnership with Placer County Health and Human Services Department started meeting the most critical demands of the community, first as a COVID testing site – and more recently as the largest vaccine clinic in Placer County.
“It just reinforces how important
@The Grounds is to our community,” said David Attaway, Chief Executive Officer of Placer Valley Tourism and
@The Grounds. “In a crisis, it has truly filled a need.””
Wasn't like they figured out you can record at home. Oh wait, only Vic has an at home studio. Oopsie. 
vocaroo.com
