5 Things To Know As St. Louis Restaurants Resume Indoor Service This Monday

St. Louis County Executive Sam Page announced new guidelines for restaurants that will go into effect when indoor dining resumes on Monday (January 4).

The new plans developed with input from the St. Louis County Department of Public Health and some local restaurant owners, KSDK noted.

Here’s what you need to know:

• Restaurants will be capped at 50 people, and parties should remain 6 feet away from one another when seated
• Restaurants and bars will be subject to a 10 p.m. curfew
• Restaurants and bars should take customers’ names and contact information to assist in contact tracing efforts
• Bars should install plexiglass, plastic or other kinds of barriers
• Page also said there will be new mask requirements coming to help protect employees

Although the indoor dining ban was intended to help mitigate the spread of COVID-19, it caused friction with some restaurant owners. Many owners look forward to welcoming customers indoors again.

"We don't mind doing our part, slowing the spread of COVID, we understand that," Mario Boccardi, owner of Joe Boccardi's Restaurant, said to KMOV. "But it just doesn't seem right that we're the only ones doing it. I hear all the time people in St. Louis County go somewhere else and then come back so I don't understand the logic of bringing it back into the community anyway. If we're going to do this, it needs to be a unified effort and it doesn't seem to be happening that way."

As of Wednesday (December 30), St. Louis County has had more than 68,800 cumulative cases. On average, 405 new COVID-19 cases are diagnosed each day, county data show.

Page said officials will share further information later in the day.

“We’re able to make this policy change because the numbers are going in the right direction,” Page said during his announcement Wednesday. “We worked carefully to mitigate those risks as much as possible.”

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