Bochenski ordered bars citywide to close by 11 p.m. for the indefinite future after meeting with Gov. Doug Burgum and Dr. Deborah Birx, the head of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, during their visit in Fargo on Saturday morning. He told the Herald on Monday that the idea had been floating around Grand Forks City Hall before that.
“It’s been something we’ve been thinking about for a while,” Bochenski said, later clarifying that he meant himself, City Administrator Todd Feland, Project Coordinator Spencer Halvorson and Communications Specialist Greta Silewski. “And then after having some conversations with the governor and with Dr. Birx, and listening to the roundtable down there, there’s concern about the older population and vulnerable population getting infected, and it usually follows, so we wanted to … try to stem the spread.”
The hours between 11 p.m. to 2 a.m. – when Grand Forks bars would typically close – is when younger people tend to congregate, Bochenski said. COVID-19 cases have skyrocketed in Grand Forks County, and the majority of active cases are among people between the ages of 15 and 29. By 11, the mayor explained, most bars have tapered off food service and begin to focus mainly on alcohol service. Bochenski said he didn’t consult with Debbie Swanson, who directs Grand Forks Public Health, about the specific cutoff time, but said she supported the move in broad terms. Swanson did not immediately return a Herald request for comment for this article.
UND Student Body President Matthew Ternus said he believes the decision to close bars early was the right move.
“Like me, there's plenty of students who think that right now going downtown is probably not the safest option, in large settings late at night,” he said.
It’s unclear, at least on day three, whether more students headed to house parties once bars closed down. Ternus said he’s heard of house parties and large gatherings occurring off campus.
“There's people who have a mindset that if I get it, I get it over with,” he said, adding that while some students have this mindset and may think that COVID doesn’t affect them as much, there are still students who worry about spreading the virus.
Ternus was a close contact of someone who tested positive this summer, which meant he had to spend two weeks in quarantine. It wasn’t a fun time, he said. He has shared those experiences with other students, who seemed to have a better understanding of COVID’s impacts on students.
Because house parties are off campus, the university doesn’t have any disciplinary measures in place to penalize students if they are having or are attending large house parties.
“We don't have any jurisdiction off campus, so no that wouldn't be something that we could entertain,” said UND spokesman David Dodds.
“The only way that we're going to be able to continue to have a mix of in-person on campus classes and online, is that if we stop doing some of these behaviors that can contribute to the spread of the virus,” Dodds said.
The mayor called Grand Forks bar owners on Saturday afternoon to tell them about the impending order, which he signed shortly after 6 p.m. and updated to clarify some of the language within it around 10:30 a.m. Monday. He reported on Monday that even owners who weren’t happy with his decision understood the reasoning behind it.
Bochenski signed the order about four days after saying the city needed to “keep doing what we’re doing,” but said nothing had changed between then and Saturday.
“We’ve kept doing exactly what we said we’re going to do from the start,” he said. “We’re going to monitor the numbers, and the numbers had increased between Tuesday and Saturday. We had 146 cases. ‘Keep doing what we’re doing’ is monitoring the data and looking at all the data and making decisions.”
As UND students began to head back to campus for the fall, COVID figures had been spiking throughout that week and the one before it. Bochenski said there wasn’t a specific threshold that those figures surpassed.
“If you want to peg everything to a certain number, we’re not doing that,” he said. “We’re taking data as it comes and, when getting recommendations from the White House Coronavirus Task Force members, I think that’s about as high as you can go to make a decision.”
Last week, UND President Andrew Armacost told the Herald that the campus opened with “clear expectations” in place for students to follow COVID-19 guidelines and protocols, including not gathering in large groups.
UND lists 247 current reported cases of COVID-19 on its dashboard. The dashboard is reflective of self-reported cases of COVID-19 to the university. As of 3 p.m. Monday, the dashboard showed that 751 students, faculty and staff were in isolation or quarantine.
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Mayor had been considering early closing time for Grand Forks bars - Grand Forks Herald
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