Name: Tesla said to be gearing up to restart Fremont car manufacturing, in possible shelter-in-place violation
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Tesla said to be gearing up to restart Fremont car manufacturing, in possible shelter-in-place violation

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Electric car maker Tesla is preparing to restart some car production in Fremont, potentially in violation of local and state shelter-in-place orders, The Chronicle has learned.Some workers returned to the company’s Fremont plant Wednesday to prepare for a planned reopening of some production lines between now and next week, according to a person familiar with factory operations who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation. The person was granted anonymity in accordance with The Chronicle’s anonymous source policy.The person said that only a handful of employees have returned to the factory floor for now to prepare, and that additional safety measures have been put in place at the factory to guard against coronavirus transmission.Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.A spokeswoman for the Fremont Police Department, which is responsible for the area that includes the plant, said there were no plans to visit the site when informed by The Chronicle of reports of the partial return to work.Coronavirus Pandemic“We’re all sort of in a little bit of a gray area,” said department spokeswoman Geneva Bosques, referring to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s announcement this week that some retail, manufacturing, and logistics businesses would soon be allowed to operate on a limited basis if they take safety measures and local authorities approve.Bosques acknowledged that under the current Alameda County health order, Tesla cannot operate its manufacturing line but added that “having a small team of people in there (who) are social distancing may not violate the health order.”Officers from the Fremont Police Department made two previous visits to the factory in April and observed minimum basic operations, like maintenance, allowed under the health order. Tesla was not cited for violations, Bosques said.Tesla had previously openly defied the Alameda County shelter-in-place order when it was first instituted on March 17, operating for nearly a week before sending workers home. Authorities had ruled the plant was a nonessential business under the health order.Ratings for the Bay Area and California, updated every 10 minutesThat order, which was extended and is still in effect, prohibits “manufacturing or assembly of nonessential products.”Some Tesla workers received word over the last weekend in April that they would be returning to work the following week, but the company retracted those orders.Tesla CEO Elon Musk has strongly criticized the economic restrictions put in place to fight the coronavirus. Musk decried the stay-at-home orders as “fascist” during a recent call with investors and has taken to Twitter to demand the immediate reopening of the U.S. economy.Chase DiFeliciantonio is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: Twitter:Inside the newsroomThe Chronicle strives to attribute all information we report to credible, reliable, identifiable sources. Presenting information from an anonymous source occurs extremely rarely, and only when that information is considered crucially important and all other on-the-record options have been exhausted. In such cases, The Chronicle has complete knowledge of the unnamed person's identity and of how that person is in position to know the information. The Chronicle's detailed policy governing the use of such sources, including the use of pseudonyms, is available onRatings for the Bay Area and California, updated every 10 minutes

Electric car maker Tesla is preparing to restart some car production in Fremont, potentially in violation of local and state shelter-in-place orders, The Chronicle has learned.Some workers returned to the company’s Fremont plant Wednesday to prepare for a planned reopening of some production lines between now and next week, according to a person familiar with factory operations who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation. The person was granted anonymity in accordance with The Chronicle’s anonymous source policy.The person said that only a handful of employees have returned to the...

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Chase DiFeliciantonio

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Tesla said to be gearing up to restart Fremont car manufacturing, in possible shelter-in-place violation

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