County of Grande Prairie Reeve Leanne Beaupre is happy to see the COVID-19 related restrictions put in place not force the closure of businesses throughout the region.
Beaupre, who says she wasn’t surprised to see new measures put in place to help bend the curve of the virus which, suggests that the type of restrictions may still cause arguments between members of the public.
As of Tuesday afternoon, indoor social gatherings will not be permitted, while outdoor social gatherings will see limits of 10 people or less.
As of Friday, areas under enhanced measures, which include both the City of Grande Prairie and County of Grande Prairie, retail businesses and services may remain open but will be restricted to 25 per cent of occupancy limits.
Beaupre says some of the businesses where you can have larger numbers of customers at once have done extremely well with moving forward and finding the protective equipment that they need and creating protective barriers for those who come to see them.
She adds however that more stringent restrictions could have created a trickle-down effect that would have long-lasting, and long-reaching consequences.
“They have done very well making sure there aren’t cases that can be transmitted there,” she says.
“It would be devastating for them to have a complete shutdown, and the premier said it very well yesterday, those who have a guaranteed paycheque have to remember that there are a lot of others in the province that don’t.”
As of November 24th, there are 41 active cases of COVID-19 in the County of Grande Prairie.