Circuit breaker is the latest term to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Public health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry used it in reference to her Monday, March 29 order closing down indoor dining, worship services and fitness classes in B.C. as a way of hoping to stop the virus from spreading.
Williams Lake city council, however, questioned the logic of using cross-community policies and shared concerns during Tuesday’s committee of the whole meeting.
Describing the new restrictions as a gunshot to the heart of many businesses, Coun. Scott Nelson said it was disheartening that rural communities have gone out of their way to go that extra special mile to make sure that social distancing and everything is taking place and yet were still being punished at the same time as the larger urban centres.
“There’s a real disconnect at this point in time that in Williams Lake you’ve got three COVID cases and in Surrey you’ve got a thousand cases — I don’t think you need to be punishing the entire province at the same time.”
Read more:B.C. stops indoor dining, fitness, religious service due to COVID-19 spike
“I think it’s this next jab that’s going to be extended and it’s going to hurt a lot of businesses.”
Agreeing, Mayor Walt Cobb said a number of mayors are saying the rules should be made on a regional basis.
“We can’t go by what’s happening in the Lower Mainland because this is devastating,” he said.
Cobb added he hopes the government will do whatever is necessary to make sure that E.I. or support is going to be available to laid off workers that were given 24 hours notice they were out of work.
He also encouraged everyone to shop local, order takeout, and make phone calls to local stores to buy things, rather than shop online.
“Maybe for those who can afford it they can do takeout once a week to help them keep the doors open so when it opens up again there’ll be restaurants for us to go to.”
On Thursday the city provided a list of all the restaurants open for takeout on its website.
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