Advocacy News – Oct. 6
Citing authority under the Michigan Public Health Code, the state’s Director of the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services issued an Emergency Order Monday evening to reinstate mask requirements at most indoor and outdoor gatherings and events, limit attendance at indoor and outdoor gatherings and impose other limitations on certain establishments, including bars.
The order seeks to:
- Limit attendance at indoor gatherings. The order specifies: indoor gatherings of up to 10 persons occurring at residences are permitted (but face coverings are “strongly recommended” for such gatherings); indoor gatherings of up to 10 persons occurring at a non-residential venue are permitted provided each person at the gathering wears a face covering; and indoor gatherings of more than 10 and up to 500 people occurring at a nonresidential venue are permitted only to the extent that the organizers and venue comply with stated capacity requirements stated in the order and require a face covering.
- Limit attendance at outdoor gatherings. The order specifies: outdoor gatherings of up to 100 persons occurring at a residence are permitted (face coverings are “recommended” for such gatherings); outdoor gatherings of up to 100 persons occurring at a non-residential venue are permitted provided that each person at the gathering wears a face covering; and outdoor gatherings of more than 100 and up to 1,000 persons occurring at a nonresidential subject to stated capacity requirements and each person gathered wears a face covering.
- Require masks. The order specifies that, except for schools in Region 6 (defined as northern Michigan, including Traverse City), businesses, government offices, schools, and other operations must not allow indoor gatherings of any kind unless they require individuals to wear a face covering. For schools in Region 6, the wearing of face coverings is “recommended.” The order also specifies a business, school, government office or other operation “may not assume that someone who enters the business without a face covering falls in one of the exceptions specifies…including the exception for individuals who cannot medically tolerate a face covering. A business, school, government office, or other operation may, however, accept an individual’s verbal representation that they are not wearing a face covering because they fall within a specified exception.”
- The provided exceptions include: individuals who are younger than five years old; cannot medically tolerate a face covering, are eating or drinking while seated at a food service establishment; are exercising outdoors and able to consistently maintain six feet of social distance; are swimming; are receiving a service for which temporary removal of the face covering is necessary; are entering a business or are receiving a service and are asked to temporarily remove a face covering for identification purposes; are communicating with someone who is deaf, deafblind, or hard of hearing and where the ability to see the mouth is essential to communication; are actively engaged in a public safety role, including but not limited to law enforcement, firefighters, or emergency medical personnel, and where wearing a mask would seriously interfere in the performance of their public safety responsibilities; are at a polling place for purposes of voting in an election; are officiating or engaging in a religious service; and/or are giving a speech for broadcast or to an audience, provided that the audience is at least six feet away from the speaker.
- Limits on food service establishments, including bars. The order specifies that, as it relates to food service establishments, the order specifies they must close indoor common areas in which people can congregate, dance, or otherwise mingle and prohibit indoor gatherings anywhere alcoholic beverages are sold for consumption onsite, except for where parties are seated and separated from one another by at least six feet, and do not intermingle.
The order also imposes limits on organized sports, including mandating masks in many situations and limiting the number of spectators.
The order specifies violations of this order are punishable by a civil fine of up to $1,000, consistent with the amended schedule of fines, issued on May 27, 2020. The order is dated with an immediate effective date and will remain in effect through October 30, 2020.
Please contact the Chamber if you have any questions related to this new order at info@michamber.com.