Click to Read: Governor Tim Walz Emergency Executive Order 20-04 - Providing for Temporary Closure of Bars, Restaurants, and Other Places of Public Accommodation.

The following is an Executive order by Governor Tim Walz:

1. Beginning no later than March 17, 2020 at 5:00 pm, and continuing until March 27, 2020 at 5:00 pm, the following places of public accommodation are closed to ingress, egress, use, and occupancy by members of the public:

• Restaurants, food courts, cafes, coffeehouses, and other places of public accommodation offering food or beverage for on-premises consumption, excluding institutional or in-house food cafeterias that serve residents, employees, and clients of businesses, child care facilities, hospitals, and long-term care facilities.
• Bars, taverns, brew pubs, breweries, microbreweries,    distilleries, wineries, tasting rooms, clubs, and other places of public accommodation offering alcoholic beverages for on-premises consumption.
• Hookah bars, cigar bars, and vaping lounges offering their products for on premises consumption.
• Theaters, cinemas, indoor and outdoor performance venues, and museums.
• Gymnasiums, fitness centers, recreation centers, indoor sports facilities, indoor exercise facilities, exercise studios, and spas.
• Amusement parks, arcades, bingo halls, bowling alleys, indoor climbing facilities, skating rinks, trampoline parks, and other similar recreational or entertainment facilities.
• Country clubs, golf clubs, boating or yacht clubs, sports or athletic clubs, and dining clubs.

2. Places of public accommodation subject to this Executive Order are encouraged to offer food and beverage using delivery service, window service, walk-up service, drive-through service, or drive-up service, and to use precautions in doing so to mitigate the potential transmission of COVID-19, including social distancing. In
offering food or beverage, a place of public accommodation subject to this section may permit up to five members of the public at one time in the place of public accommodation for the purpose of picking up their food or beverage orders, so long
as those individuals are at least six feet apart from one another while on premises.

3. This Executive Order does not prohibit an employee, contractor, vendor, or supplier of a place of public accommodation from entering, exiting, using, or occupying that place of public accommodation in their professional capacity.

4. The restrictions imposed by this Executive Order do not apply to any of the following:

• Places of public accommodation that offer food and beverage not for on premises consumption, including grocery stores, markets, convenience stores, pharmacies, drug stores, and food pantries, other than those portions of the place of public accommodation subject to the requirements of section 1;
• Health care facilities, child care facilities, residential care facilities, congregate care facilities, and juvenile justice facilities;
• Crisis shelters, soup kitchens, or similar institutions; and
• Restaurants and food courts inside the secured zones of airports.

5. For purposes of this Executive Order, "place of public accommodation" means a business, or an educational, refreshment, entertainment, or recreation facility, or an
institution of any kind, whether licensed or not, whose goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, or accommodations are extended, offered, sold, or otherwise made available to the public.

6. This Executive Order does not alter any of the obligations under law of an employer affected by this Executive Order to its employees or to the employees of another employer.

7. Pursuant to Minnesota Statutes 2019, section 12.45, a person who willfully violates paragraphs 1 of this Executive Order is guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction must be punished by a fine not to exceed $1,000, or by imprisonment for not more than 90 days.

8. Local law enforcement and public health authorities are directed to monitor and enforce this Executive Order in accordance with the law.

For questions regarding these Executive Orders, please feel free to contact the Environmental Health Division at 952-563-8934 or email at envhealth@bloomingtonmn.gov.