For weeks Gov. Gavin Newsom teased an endemic plan that seemed as though it would bring an end to the California government’s often heavy-handed and arbitrary response to COVID-19.

“We recognize that we want to turn the page on the status quo,” Newsom said last Monday.

And then a few days later, Newsom unveiled his SMARTER plan, which showed he is not turning the page just yet.

In unveiling his plan, Newsom’s press release said it was the next step in the state’s “Nation-Leading Pandemic Response,” though we have no idea what measure he’s citing as nation-leading.

Politico issued a scorecard of the states in December and California ranked 28th overall, and there was no individual category (from health to economy to education) where the state led the nation.

Gas-lighting aside, Newsom’s SMARTER plan offers few new ideas and essentially proposed extending Newsom’s on-a-whim emergency management in perpetuity.

The SMARTER plan calls for a vaccine push, a stockpile of masks, a public information campaign, more testing, a goal of immediate access to new treatments, continuing to “work” to keep schools open and greater readiness, such as hiring more healthcare professionals and monitoring of new variants.

All of that is generally fine — though we wish the governor would be firm on insisting that schools remain open for in-person instruction — but it can be done without the governor retaining indefinite emergency powers.

Certainly, some of the SMARTER plan is necessary. Greater access to testing is essential and continuing to vaccinate the population will help keep mortality rates low and hospital beds available.

While breakthrough infections have been more common than many wishes, the fact is that unvaccinated adults have more than double the risk of infection and 14 times the risk of death compared to fully vaccinated adults, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Unvaccinated adults likewise have a three times higher risk of infection and 41 times greater risk of death compared to vaccinated individuals with a booster shot.

This has critical implications for not only the unvaccinated, who, in general, ought to get vaccinated, but also public policy. Newsom continues to maintain emergency powers in the absence of an actual emergency.

In contrast, Colorado’s Democratic Gov. Jared Polis declared the COVID emergency over last summer and left it up to local jurisdictions to determine whether masking requirements and other restrictions were necessary. Even amid recent spikes, Polis maintained his position that, “At this point, if you haven’t been vaccinated, it’s really your own darn fault.”

While Newsom insists on believing the course of the pandemic has been largely reliant on whether he has or exercises emergency powers, according to the New York Times, the death rate over the last seven days in Colorado is just 0.11 per 100,000, compared to 0.39 per 100,000 in California.

Newsom hasn’t been and won’t be a national leader on COVID. But he could be a smarter leader and follow the lead of wise governors like Jared Polis.