New health orders, bridge grants announced

Manitoba unveiled new public health orders coming into effect on Friday, almost entirely resembling the proposed changes first floated last week.

On Tuesday morning, Premier Brian Pallister and chief provincial public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin addressed Manitobans to reveal the new orders.

The finalized list of lighter restrictions, which are in effect from March 5-26, are as follows:

• Allowing all businesses except indoor theatres, indoor concert halls, casinos and bingo halls to reopen.

• Allowing households to continue to have two designated visitors to their home or to designate a second household to visit with, as long as every member of the household authorizes the designation. Households can only choose one of the two options.

• Increasing outdoor gathering limits to 10 people, including non-organized sports or recreation activities.

• Increasing the size of gathering limits at places of worship for services to 25 per cent of maximum capacity or 100 people, whichever is lower, while still maintaining physical distancing and mask use.

• Expanding capacity limits for stores, malls and personal services to up to 50 per cent of maximum capacity or 250 people, whichever is lower.

• Expanding capacity limits for restaurants and licensed premises to up to 50 per cent of maximum capacity while still requiring that only members of the same household dine together.

• Allowing businesses other than casinos to start operating video lottery terminals once again.

• Allowing theatre groups, dance companies, symphonies and operas to resume rehearsals as long as members of the public are not allowed to attend.

• Allowing day camps for kids to operate at 25 per cent capacity.

• Allowing dance, theatre and music facilities to open for individual instruction and group classes with a maximum capacity of 25 per cent.

• Allowing indoor recreational facilities (arcades, go-karts, etc.) to reopen at 25 per cent capacity.

• Allowing all indoor recreation and sporting facilities to reopen at 25 per cent capacity, with public health measures in place for spectators, common areas and locker rooms. The requirement for one-on-one instruction only has been removed. Users of gyms, fitness centres and pool facilities must still wear masks except when in a swimming pool.

“We’ll continue to evaluate whether we can stay at this level or continue to cautiously reopen,” said Roussin. “Looking ahead, we know many Manitobans are beginning to make their Easter and Passover plans. With these changes, people will be able to celebrate with another household. While I understand that this is not how we all wish to celebrate, it is more than we were able to do last year and still necessary to keep the transmission of the virus down.”

On the subject of the households-only dining rule, Roussin acknowledged the rule is hard on people and restaurants, but the province can’t take the risk of people from multiple households having close, prolonged indoor contact.

With dancing and acting classes allowed to take place as of Friday, the Brandon School of Dance said it would be holding in-person classes again that day while Mecca Productions said it would be restarting operations next week.

Mecca co-founder Lisa Vasconcelos said that with singing being a potential hazard because of COVID, the company would instead work toward performing an adult-focused drama this fall.

Brandon School of Dance owner Brent Campbell said students taking Zoom-based classes have been waiting for the day they could return to the studio. He thanked students and parents that have kept supporting the school while its physical location was closed.

More than just new health orders, the premier also announced the third round of $5,000 Manitoba Bridge Grant funding would be going out to businesses, non-profits and charities that had to close due to public health orders or had their operations severely impacted by them.

Eligible businesses that already received payments in the first and second rounds will automatically have $5,000 sent to them as early as this Friday.

According to the premier, more than 14,000 organizations have benefitted so far from the bridge grant program, totalling more than $135 million in support. After the third round, he said the amount of money paid out through the program will end up totalling around $215 million.

“I wouldn’t take anything off the table,” Pallister said about future business supports. “We have another $50 million that we’re looking to allocate. We’ve allocated some already to the restaurant industry for some specific support programs, we’re looking at the hotel industry as well for some additional supports.

The Sun asked the premier about comments made last week by Brandon Chamber of Commerce president Spencer Day, who expressed frustration that Prairie Mountain Health was not put under less stringent restrictions given low case numbers, said the one-size-fits-all approach to the bridge grants wasn’t working for some businesses and accused Pallister of ignoring Westman’s needs.

“As a former chamber of commerce president, I would sympathize with the frustration of small business people and recognize that a chamber president might want to express frustration about the nature of a pandemic and its effects on businesses,” said Pallister.

“But I would also like the chamber president to acknowledge, in fairness, that we have created a greater climate for the profitability of small businesses prior to this pandemic than existed before, that we have led the country in reducing unnecessary red tape, that we’ve enhanced the supports for our business community, that we’ve reduced taxes for our small business community ... in fairness, I would ask for that balanced perspective and I understand the frustrations as a former small business owner myself.”

Pallister said he understands the desire to reopen, but he also knows that both he and Day want to save lives, which Roussin has said has been accomplished by the health orders in place.

Speaking to the Sun on Tuesday afternoon, Day said while he appreciates the premier putting a third round of bridge grants in place, he still believes there is a more tiered and strategic approach that could have been taken in distributing COVID support funds. He said the chamber would be following up with local MLAs about the possibility of aid for the hotel industry.

Once again, Day criticized the province’s approach to restrictions.

“We can appreciate the province’s cautious reopening approach, but obviously their regional approach has gone right out the window,” said Day. “We have 14 active cases today in all of Prairie Mountain Health, two active cases in Brandon. What as a region do we have to do to get out of code red?”

While Day said he appreciates what the current government has done for small businesses, he didn’t think Pallister answered the questions about whether he was paying attention to the needs of Westman.

“We’ve had a lot of correspondence sent out from our chamber office to the premier and to Dr. Roussin, and all of it’s gone unanswered except for one brief response we received from Minister Eichler.”

In a phone call with the Sun, Manitoba NDP Leader Wab Kinew said he agreed with the assessment that Pallister is ignoring Westman. He pointed to Pallister refusing to participate in a party leaders’ debate in Brandon during the 2019 provincial election campaign as an example.

“We’ve been hearing from many sources in the community, chamber leadership and the business community about not having their concerns addressed or even at the very least, acknowledged,” said Kinew. “Westman’s an important region in the province and the government had promised a regional approach, so we’d like to see Mr. Pallister live up to that commitment.”

However, Kinew stopped short of saying that Prairie Mountain Health and Westman should be under fewer restrictions, instead saying he would have to defer to Dr. Roussin’s expertise on the issue.

“Even if Mr. Pallister isn’t going to necessarily give folks in Westman everything that they’re asking for, he should at the very least explain to people in the Westman about the decisions his government is making,” he said.

When asked what his party is doing to stay in touch with the needs of people in the region, Kinew said Manitoba NDP president and Brandonite Lonnie Patterson has helped facilitate conversations between him and community groups.

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