Regina businesses taking proactive approach to COVID variant cases

The rise in COVID-19 variant cases in Regina has some businesses choosing to temporarily close their doors, even without the provincial government’s request.

Rainbow Cinemas as well as the RCMP Heritage Centre have both decided to take a proactive approach in dealing with the COVID variant cases in the city.

Dan Toppings with the Heritage Centre says closing down felt like the right thing to do.

“We looked at what the Regina and surrounding area schools were doing and being that they were closing, we thought we would follow suit to get this variant down,” Toppings said.

“We weren’t forced to close. Right now we’re coming up on our year-end inventory so we thought this was a perfect opportunity to kind of kill two birds with one stone. We can close to the general public to keep them safe and it also allows us to deal with maintenance issues in our building.”

Rainbow Cinemas could not be reached for comment but issued a similar message in a Facebook post.

“With variants out in the air messing things up, we have decided to take a short break to do some spring cleaning. We’ll be taking the time to get everything here in tip-top shape to provide you with the best experience possible when we come back,” the post read.

“We decided to take this course of action for the health and safety of our employees, and you, our valued patrons.”

Neither business had a timeline as to when they would be deciding to reopen.

“I would love to get the numbers down and I think the only way we’re going to do that is if businesses and individuals take this matter seriously so we can stop this virus from controlling our lives,” Toppings said.

“This is an individual decision for each business.”