Local restaurant concerned on COVID spike at Notre Dame

SOUTH BEND, Ind.-- CJ’s Pub has been around since 1984, and for the last 36 years has held a strong relationship with Notre Dame.

“We’ve been in business a long time,” CJ’s Pub Owner Judy Gish said. “We’ve had a connection with Notre Dame since then.”

During a normal year, CJ’s Pub owner Judy Gish said students and fans pile into the restaurant to enjoy a meal and watch the Notre Dame games on the flat screen.

“People come in to watch the games especially if they can’t get tickets, and not just, we got football, basketball, baseball and hockey,” Gish said.

Due to the pandemic, normal looks a lot different and many businesses are feeling the effects, including CJ’s.

The case count at Notre Dame continues to climb with now close to 250 students coming down with the coronavirus.

Gish said that business has been more slow than usual since the pandemic, and now feels the effects even more with the recent spike in Notre Dame’s cases

“It affects our business greatly to be honest with you,” Gish said. “It’s the restaurant, Notre dame, the community. Our business is not anywhere near close to where it usually is.”

Gish worries that even more people will avoid leaving their house for a bite to eat at CJ’s because of this increase in cases.

In order to make the restaurant staff and customers feel comfortable and safe, Gish said that she plans to stick with strict safety precautions throughout the restaurant.

“Things happen you know, you could today be somewhere and be exposed and not even know it. You know, but we are very, very cautious, everybody walks in with a mask,” Gish said. “Safety first! You can see by the tables that we’re 6 feet apart, we want everybody to be safe, that’s number one, your health is always number one.”

Gish said that she still keeps a positive mindset that things will get better, and that she’ll see more Domer’s feeling comfortable to come back soon.

“Right now it’s like everybody, we are all saying lots of prayers that this gets over,” Gish said. “I hope that this virus gets behind us so we can get back to normal.”