What do the colors mean?
Posted on 05/27/2020 4:39:46 PM PDT by lightman
Pa. bars, restaurants, and retail food service businesses now have a game plan for what will be allowed when they reopen amid the coronavirus pandemic.
New guidance released by Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration on Wednesday offers a detailed list of how many people can visit a spot at one time, whether or not masks will be mandated, and what the rules are in specific counties.
Here’s everything you need to know.
What can reopen, and when?
Bars, restaurants, and retail food service businesses located in a green county of Wolf’s color-coded reopening plan can offer limited dine-in options indoors and outdoors starting May 29. That’s when the first 17 counties will reach that phase, and they include: Bradford, Cameron, Centre, Clarion, Clearfield, Crawford, Elk, Forest, Jefferson, Lawrence, McKean, Montour, Potter, Snyder, Sullivan, Tioga, Venango, and Warren.
Bars, restaurants, and retail food service businesses located in a yellow county can offer limited dine-in options with outdoor seating only starting June 5. Every county in the state is expected to be in either that phase or the green one by then.
What will the capacity limits be?
Two methods will be used, per Wolf’s guidelines:
"Method 1. Limit to 50% of stated fire capacity or 12 people per 1,000 square feet if there is not a fire code number available. When no fire code number is available for outdoor dining, the 12 people per 1,000 square feet number should be applied.
“Method 2. Arrange the restaurant or retail food service business so that customers sitting at a table are not within six feet of any customers sitting at another table in any direction and calculate the maximum number of customers that can be accommodated.”
What is mandated at green-phase bars
Per the guidelines:
"Bar seating may be utilized if customers are seated and comply with physical distancing guideline of at least 6 feet or physical barriers between customers. Standing in a bar area will not be permitted.
“A maximum of four customers that have a common relationship may sit together at the bar, while adhering to the physical distancing guidelines or barriers between other customers.”
And what about places offering outdoor dine-in options in the yellow zone?
Again, per the guidelines:
"Indoor areas, including bar areas, of restaurants and retail food service businesses must be closed to customers except for through-traffic. Non-bar seating in outdoor areas (i.e., tables or counter seats that do not line up to a bar or food service area) may be used for customer seating.
"Customers being served must be seated at a table.
"Prohibitions are also included. The following are not permitted:
"Self-service food or drink options, such as buffets, salad bars, condiments, and drink stations. "Condiments on tables; these must be dispensed by employees upon the request of a customer. "Reusable menus. “Refilling food and beverage containers or allowing implements brought in by customers.”
Will masks be required?
In a section of the guidelines for what restaurants, bars, and retail food service buisinesses must do (emphasis theirs), it declares the following for customers:
“Require all customers to wear masks while entering, exiting, or otherwise traveling throughout the restaurant or retail food service business. Face coverings may be removed while seated.”
It says the following about employees:
“Provide non-medical masks for employees to wear at all times and make it mandatory to wear masks while at the restaurant or retail food service business. An employee does not need to wear a mask if it impedes their vision, if they have a medical condition, or if it would create an unsafe condition in which to operate equipment or execute a task. Employers may approve masks obtained or made by employees according to Department of Health policies.”
Those who cannot wear a mask for medical reasons do not have to wear one and won’t be asked for documentation, the guidelines say.
All that said, Wolf said Wednesday that mask requirements are not law, and so it could be interpreted that individual bars, restaurants, and food retail businesses will be able to decide whether or not masks have to be worn most of the time, some of the time, or not at all. It could be also seen, however, that the must part of the guidelines are a requirement and thus could put any business that does not follow them at risk of losing a license or insurance coverage.
What do the colors mean?
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so sayth the king.
A little longer and there won't be any bars, restruants and gyms left in business.
You can shop at Walmart without a mask but you can't get a drink or a meal at a bar & grill here in Washington Co where we've had very, very little CCCP Virus.
Centre county was moved to green as well for this Friday . I wonder how many Penn a State students try to flood the bars. Not that it bothers me!
Shove the rules..either open normal or not open at all.
I will have nothing to do with a new normal. I am about ready to go Galt.
Same here. In Connecticut restaurants cannot open inside dining until June 20 And masks will be required through all three phases of “reopening” which is expected to be May 20 June 20 and July 20 each phase lasting approximately one month.
I really have no intention of playing the little game of wear a mask if you dare walk in the restaurant but taking it off at your table is fine, etc. Same with businesses that it is suddenly now safe to shop in a clothing store with a mask but I could shop at Walmart the entire time And buy clothes. I am really considering simply sticking to only purchasing necessities or buying online until these democrat governor’s lift the bull crap restrictions. I don’t go out to a restaurant to be treated like a diseased person who could potential he kill people from breathing, I go out to a restaurant to enjoy myself. If these governors want to treat people this way I am more than happy to just not spend any of my money at these local businesses.
“... what will be allowed...” ???
This is America. Dickless Levine and Smarm Meister cannot stipulate “what will be allowed” to a free people.
Get out there and DEFY!
Memo to Dick Wolf: Take your color coded charts and put them where the sun don’t shine.
PA people - slave or free?
Maybe this is simply a quality of life thing. Conservatives value life. Conservatives want to fully enjoy the value of life by living in freedom. Democrats murder babies. If someone can murder innocent babies, then what do they care about anyone’s life, including their own. I generally don’t bring abortion into arguments, but I think this actually applies from a character perspective.
Screw Governor sh!tbag. I’m taking my paycheck and spending it in Ohio where it’s wanted. Meals, groceries, haircuts, a new car...all are being bought in Ohio and paying Ohio taxes. The only thing I’m doing in PA is VOTE...and Governow sh!tbag’s party ain’t gonna like it either.
Just like the Bert and Ernie color coding during the “War on Terror” days. Government is a clown show.
I touch my face.
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