Rock Island Today

Cambridge Chronicle recently issued the following announcement.

Businesses could face fines of up to $2,500 if they fail to enforce rules requiring face coverings and limiting crowd sizes under new emergency rules announced Friday by Gov. JB Pritzker.

The new rules, which will face a bipartisan legislative panel next week, immediately came under fire from some Republican lawmakers and retailers for targeting businesses with penalties.

Those developments came on the same day that the Illinois Department of Public Health reported more than 2,000 additional cases of COVID-19. There are now 13 counties in the state that are exceeding two or more metrics used to determine if an area is keeping control of the spread of the coronavirus. Sangamon County, which was previously on the warning list, is now off of it. Winnebago County is on the list.

At a Chicago news conference, Pritzker said, “This is a make or break moment for the state of Illinois.” He said the new rules are significantly less harmful to businesses than laws currently on the books that provide for misdemeanor charges to be filed and for licenses or other business permits to be revoked.

“These rules are a common-sense way to enforce mask requirements without jumping immediately to the extremely tough consequences that exist on the books today,” Pritzker said.

Pritzker said a majority of businesses in the state have followed current guidelines to require the wearing of face coverings indoors and to limit crowds to no more than 50 people or 50% of capacity in the effort to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus.

“These rules will ensure that the minority who refuse to act responsibly won’t take the state backward,” he said.

Under a three-step process, a business that isn’t enforcing the guidelines for masks and crowd sizes will first be issued a warning and urged to comply with the rules. Those that remain noncompliant will be ordered to make some or all of their customers leave the premises. Finally, continued noncompliance could result in a fine of $75 to $2,500 and a Class A misdemeanor charge.

The possibility of business fines isn’t sitting well with the Illinois Retail Merchants Association.

“This proposed rule lacks common sense and is a slap in the face to the thousands of retailers who have sacrificed so much during this pandemic while actively supporting ever-changing health and safety guidelines adopted by the state,” said IRMA President and CEO Rob Karr. “If the goal is to put public health above politics, the administration will amend the rule to focus enforcement efforts on individuals who are not complying instead of punishing and attempting to demonize innocent businesses.”

However, Sam Toia, president and CEO of the Illinois Restaurant Association, said “the governor’s order today is a further step to drive home the fact extra safety precautions are necessary for everyone during this critical time. We want to stay on a steady path and keep our progress toward reopening.”

Shutting down the economy again, he said, “would be the death of the hospitality industry.”

House Republican Leader Jim Durkin of Western Springs said Pritzker should immediately call the General Assembly into special session to address Pritzker’s anti-virus enforcement ideas and also “address the urgent need for ethics reform and the controversies surrounding the Democratic Party and speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives.”

“Today, I am calling on Governor Pritzker to abandon his ‘mask rule’ and work with the Legislature on this issue,” Durkin said. “I am committed to respecting his priorities while recognizing the undue hardship his current rule places on businesses that are already struggling across Illinois.”

Pritzker countered that several other states have enacted nearly identical enforcement mechanisms, including some led by Republican governors.

There is not now a uniform system for taking action against businesses that won’t comply with the requirements for mask wearing and limited crowd sizes. Some communities, including Sangamon County and the city of Springfield, have enacted their own policies for warnings to and fines of non-compliant businesses.

“We want to make sure there is a minimum enforcement mechanism for every city and county in the state,” Pritzker said. “I’m confident the vast majority of people in the state of Illinois want us to have an enforcement mechanism.”

Pritzker previously tried to issue emergency rules that allowed for fines and misdemeanor charges to be filed against businesses and individuals that refused to comply with guidelines to control the spread of the coronavirus. He withdrew those rules when it became apparent a legislative oversight panel would not approve them. Pritzker said the General Assembly was then going to enact legislation to do the same thing, but it failed to do so during the abbreviated spring legislative session.

The new version of the rules is expected to go before that same panel next week. The Joint Committee on Administrative Rules is evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats.

Shortly after Pritzker held his news conference, IDPH came out with new daily statistics showing the highest number of new daily cases in weeks. There are 2,084 new cases, bringing the state total to 190,508. The positivity rate has gone up again and now sits at 4.1%.

There were 21 additional deaths, bringing the total to 7,613.

Also Friday, Pritzker signed a bill passed by the General Assembly in May to provide greater protections to workers at retail establishments who are assigned to enforce face covering and other coronavirus rules. It also increases paid disability leave for first responders whose recovery from injuries is delayed because of the pandemic.

Original source can be found here.