BANFF – Banff council has backed away from limiting business hours for restaurants and bars beyond current provincial regulations, but has moved to cut the number of patrons permitted by half in a bid to stop the rapid spread of COVID-19 in the community.
In addition, the new bylaw approved by council during a marathon meeting on Monday (Nov. 30) requires cannabis and liquor stores to close no later than 10 p.m. to bring them in line with restaurant and bar liquor sales.
Councillors Corrie DiManno, Peter Poole and Chip Olver voiced strong support for tougher measures in Banff, calling for restaurants and bars to stop serving alcohol at 8 p.m. and close by 9 p.m. as proposed in the bylaw – but lost on a close 4-3 vote.
“Last week, I personally was disappointed in what the province announced,” Coun. DiManno said.
“This is obviously a temporary bylaw and can be reviewed if this thing starts to turn around … I am trying to keep our community as safe as we can, and I feel like this is one of those measures that can help,” she dded.
“For me, a filter is how do we remove that temptation of social gathering, and I think if we have these restricted hours, it’s going to help remove that temptation and curb that for this three weeks, and hopefully we can see progress in our case count going down.”
The Town of Banff declared a state of local emergency on Nov. 25 to supplement measures enacted under the provincial public health emergency, to stop the rapid spread of COVID-19 in Banff, which has the second highest number per capita cases in Alberta.
As of Tuesday (Dec. 1), the positive case count in Banff and Lake Louise was 185. In neighbouring Canmore, there was 93 positive cases and 29 in the Municipal District of Bighorn.
Province-wide, there were 16,628 active cases, including 470 in hospital and 97 in intensive care. The COVID-19 death toll across Alberta rose to 551.
Mayor Karen Sorensen and Councillor Grant Canning argued against restaurants and bars closing earlier, instead preferring to follow provincial measures when it comes to business hours – serving liquor until 10 p.m. and closing by 11 p.m.
While Councillors Brian Standish and Ted Christensen supported the mayor and Canning in their vote, they did not participate in the debate during the lengthy discussions on business restrictions.
Under the proposed bylaw, Banff restaurants could still provide takeout, curb side pickup, drive-thru or delivery services beyond 9 p.m. if they closed at that time, but Mayor Sorensen feared unintended consequences by limiting hours of operation.
“Reducing a restaurant that is allowed to be open and serve, and reducing their hours by a couple of hours in the evening, I just don’t think is going to have a huge impact,” she said.
“Where we’re going to see a a huge impact is by our ability to enforce and we’re going to need to enforce and keep consistently enforcing, and the mass testing that is going to be done in our community.”
Coun. Canning said he believed lowering the occupancy levels would be more effective than limiting hours of operation for restaurants and bars.
“With proper restrictions on occupancy, whether it be 50 per cent or some other number, I think it actually is more beneficial to discourage the spread of the virus if you allow the businesses to stay open longer,” he said.
“Rather than trying to compress it down to a smaller window of time, if you allow that window to be slightly longer, then you actually allow for less interaction over the course of the evening amongst the patrons.”
Coun. Poole said stricter measures are needed until the case counts go down significantly in Banff, at least to the provincial average.
“The science from public health persuades me of the importance of implementing decisive action now,” he said, noting limiting hours of bars and restaurants is one way to limit people mixing.
Following the 4-3 decision against limiting hours, Coun. Poole tried to have occupancy limited to 25 per cent instead of the 50 per cent proposed in the bylaw – but that too lost on a 4-3 vote.
Based on his personal experience of running a restaurant, he said this would mean businesses could create more space between patrons.
“Having more space between tables will be safer for our staff, safer for our guests and safer for our community,” Coun. Poole said, adding that new provincial measures restrict retail stores to 25 per cent of their typical number of customers.
The new bylaw does, however, require cannabis and liquor stores to close at 10 p.m.
“The rationale there is that no liquor sales occur in the town consistently, so whether we’re talking about a liquor store or whether we’re talking about a restaurant, I believe it’s important that it’s consistent,” Sorensen said.
“Previous to this, although restaurants and bars were allowed to serve to 10 p.m. and no later, cannabis and liquor stores have other rules in place, and right now, the one manager I spoke to, they stay open to midnight.”
The bylaw remains in effect until Dec. 21, but council can review it before that.
The Town of Banff’s bylaw officers will enforce the bylaw, and anyone caught violating the new rules could face a fine of $1,000.
