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After thinking on it a bit more, I think that Ohana's main issue is this: She wants her relationship with Ko to remain as it was prior to his romantic confession to her.
She's not quite ready for serious romance in her life, but she greatly values Ko as her friend.
This puts her in a catch 22: She either accepts a romance that she doesn't feel up to, or she formally rejects Ko which she probably fears will ruin their friendship.
So, with this in mind, I think that the definitive impact of Ko's confession is how it contributes to Ohana's broader "coming of age". In other words, she's learning that things can't always stay the same, and that change is inevitable in life.
First she had to adapt to that through moving from the city to the relatively rural Inn.
Now she's having to adapt to that at a broader relationship level.
So the romantic conflicts in this anime are not existing in a vacuum. Ohana is at the center of them, and these conflicts are primarily meant to contribute to her coming of age story as presented in this anime.
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