Thunder Bay businesses prepare for lockdown starting on Boxing Day

Thunder Bay, Ont., and surrounding areas will jumpto lockdown restrictions along with the rest of the province starting Dec. 26 as the Ford government moves to curb climbing COVID-19 case numbers.

For some local businesses owners, the announcementcauses a mix of emotions as they prepare to transition from the provincial COVD-19 framework "orange-restrict" category to "grey-lockdown" for two weeks starting on Boxing Day.

"Any time you have to closethere's a risk," explained Jim Hupka, vice-chair of the Fort William business district BIAand owner of Mister JMen'sFashion.

Hupka said while the new restrictions make him feel tense, he's hopeful that the 14-day period will not have as great an impact on businesses as some of the lockdown measures did back in March.

He said because of the time of year, some businesses might have planned to reduce their hours between Christmas and New Years.

"So a number of those days might beand I'm just using the loose terms ... non productive days anyways, just because of the way the time of year is. So we hope that the two-week impact will not be as severe as it could be," he explained.

Charla Robinson, president of the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce, agreed that the timing of the lockdown might help businesses. She added that she's hopeful the measures will allow the region to get back on track for the rest of the winter.

"I certainly would expect most businesses aren't really, you know, overly excited about being potentially told that they have to shut their doors. There's certainly a big impact to their livelihoods, to themselves and their employees but I think people understand that maybe this is a better time than waiting," said Robinson.

Support for businesses

On the heels of the province-wide lockdown announcement, the Ford government also announced a new Ontario Small Business Support Grant which will provide a minimum of $10,000 and up to $20,000 to eligible small business owners.

Robinson said she's expecting the grant will help to ease some the anxiety felt by businesses during this time, and that the additional supports implemented through the pandemic by both provincial and federal governments continue to help.

"So there are quite a few programs. The challenge, I think, is sometimes not everybody is eligible for all of the programs that are available, and so, you know, going through all of the eligibility requirements for everything and going through the application process can be very time consuming as well as sometimes a little bit overwhelming when you're in a situation like this," she said.