Local restaurants expanding capacity on June 12th

Governor Eric Holcomb’s Back On Track plan for stage 4 was originally supposed to begin on Sunday, June 14, but has now moved up to Friday, June 12.

For some restaurants here in the South Bend area, this next stage means a lot for their business.

During the start of the pandemic, curbside pick-up was the “norm,” but currently, restaurants have been able to seat their customers at 50% capacity starting back at stage 2, while also following CDC health and safety guidelines.

“We’ve roped off our tables and we’ve had limited amount of people, our patio as we’re sitting on right now, all four of these tables are open as well, as for guidelines, we’ve measured everything 6 feet perfectly,” Assistant Manager at Aladdin’s Eatery Hannah Wallace said.

“We had them come in and fill up bottles with soap and water, sanitizer, we ordered a lot of gloves, and everybody was being temped before they walked in,” Assistant Manager at The Lauber Andy Martinez said.

Now, Holcomb’s stage 4 Back On Track plan is expected to start up in just a few days, meaning restaurants, and bars with restaurant services will be able to open their doors up at a 75-percent capacity limit.

For some restaurants like The Lauber in South Bend, their bar will open up with limitations and strict social distancing guidelines.

These local restaurant managers said that they don’t plan on easing up on safety precautions at their restaurants anytime soon.

“From the moment that we opened we asked that everyone wore masks when coming into the building and we’re continuing to do that as of right now,” Martinez said.

“Every time we touch anything it’s a glove change, run food to a table, it’s a glove change, touch the POS system it’s a glove change, every pen we use is sanitized after it’s used directly afterwards just to be safe for us and for our gusts so i assume that we will continue to do that probably until we reach the 100 percent mark,” Wallace said.

The managers hope that stage 4 will encourage folks to step out of the house, interact and enjoy their meals at the restaurants that they enjoy.

“Right now we’re at a state where even a smile from someone you don’t necessarily know, it just makes your day and that’s one of the other things that we are trying to encourage and we’re excited to bring all these people and meet new people,” Martinez said.

Aside from restaurants expanding their capacity, there are some places like movie theaters, zoos and museums that are opening up for the very first time on Friday.