Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners declared and adopted a “Safer At Home” Order effective Thursday, March 26, 2020, at 12:00 noon for individuals, business owners, and any place of public assembly to slow the spread of the COVID-19 virus.
What the order means:
RESIDENTS:
Pinellas residents are ordered to comply with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines of social distancing (6 feet of separation from others and no group gatherings of more than 10), stay home as much as possible and limit non-essential activity. Residents can still leave their homes to meet essential needs such as food, healthcare, laundry and outdoor recreation. Essential activities include:
- Direct care or support of family members
- Healthcare and medical services
- Pharmacies, health care supply stores, and health care facilities
- Groceries
- Meal take-outs from local food establishments (including food banks)
- Essential work duties that cannot be performed from home
- Primary or emergency care or direct care support for a family member or relative
- Banks and related financial institutions
- Laundry services, laundromats
- Essential home repairs and maintenance (lawn care, plumbing, roofing, etc.)
- Outdoor activity while following CDC guidelines (examples include: walking pet, hiking, biking).
- Veterinarians and pet boarding facilities
- Gas stations, auto-supply and auto-repair facilities
PLACES OF ASSEMBLY
Places that facilitate public assembly, whether indoors or outdoors are ordered to close to the public. This includes, places like public play grounds, publicly accessible children’s play centers, bowling alleys, movies and other theaters, country clubs, social clubs and fraternal organizations. Any gatherings involving groups of 10 or more will be told to disperse.
County public parks will stay open, however, all playgrounds within the park will be closed. For more information about parks visit http://www.pinellascounty.org/park/default.htm.
BUSINESSES:
Non-essential businesses are ordered to close storefront operations and customer foot traffic if they can’t meet CDC guidelines. However, businesses may continue internal and minimum basic operations required to maintain the businesses. Businesses are still required to enforce the CDC social distancing guidelines.
Essential businesses may continue operations following the appropriate guidelines to the maximum extent possible. Essential businesses include the following:
- First Responders, Police and Fire, Jails and Prisons
- Hospitals, clinics and other healthcare operations
- Community based organizations providing meals and social services
- Human Service operations
- Garbage and Sanitation workers
- Transportation: including airports and public transportation such as PSTA (Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority)
- Utilities, Public Works and essential infrastructure
- Critical trades: (Plumbers, Electricians, Exterminators, Security personnel, etc.)
- Government essential service workers
- Gas Stations
- Food: (grocery stores, food banks, restaurants: delivery, take-out or curbside delivery)
- Banks and financial institutions
- Laundromats
- Funeral Services
- Hotel and lodging
- Hardware and supply stores
- Post offices and shipping services
Businesses that do not comply with the order will be subject to the appropriate enforcement action up to and including orders to close and criminal charges.
Additional information about the Stay at Home order will be posted regularly on Pinellas County’s COVID-19 resource page: www.pinellascounty.org/covid19.
Information courtesy of the Town of Indian Shores.
Tampa Bay Beaches Chamber of Commerce Advocating for You:
Tampa Bay Beaches Chamber of Commerce has submitted the following requests to Federal, State and County officials, FL Chamber, US Chamber, and FRLA. They will continue to raise questions and seek solutions. Thank you to all entities for assisting.
- Extension of additional tax payment dates outside of federal (Intangible, Sales tax, property tax) AND / OR * Tax credits on any of the above. (percentage of which seems fair especially for the 2021 Intangible that will be due)
- Create and implement satellite or virtual rooms to assist businesses and employees to complete assessments, loans, surveys, grants, etc.
- Industry (Travel & Tourism) specific incentive – financial assistance programs that are NOT loans.
- Increase unemployment calculations/max amounts and requirements
- Ask municipalities to lift business tax licenses fees or a one time forgiveness or in half
- Working with suppliers to increase the NET billing for businesses
Explore the Tampa Bay Beaches Chamber of Commerce Resources at https://www.tampabaybeaches.com/coronavirus/.