Many Lethbridge businesses have temporarily closed or changed the way they operate because of the water emergency.
Grocery stores, restaurants, food processors, even the big Home and Garden Show at Exhibition Park are reducing the amount of water that they use.
“Our primary interest right away is the impact on food processors,” said Cheryl Dick, CEO of Economic Development Lethbridge. “There are very significant regulations on how to ensure that we have safe food supply.”
Some restaurants in Lethbridge are closed with signs advising people they won’t open until they’re told to. Others have changed how they operate.
“We aren’t serving the same meals that we usually do. We aren’t using our plates or our bowls or anything like that, we’re using everything paper,” said Sienna Moir from Esquires Coffee House. “We usually have a sanitizer to sanitize all of our dishes but we can’t use that so we have to wash everything by hand.”
Car washes have closed to conserve water.
Get daily National news
Brian Haayema at Crown Car Wash said, “With all of our car washes being shut down there’s some revenue lost, but this is what we need to do to be corporately responsible and we’ll continue to do that until we get the all clear that we can open up again.”
Water is also being conserved at Exhibition Park where the Home and Garden Show is underway. Officials expect up to 25,000 people to attend the Home and Garden Show before it wraps up on Saturday.
Doug Kryzanowski, marketing and promotions manager at Exhibition Park said, “We’re doing due diligence according to the city on conserving as much as we can. We’ve got all the washrooms technically shut down with tap water, etc. It’s a big show and we’re doing everything the city is basically instructing everybody to do.”
Laundromats are closed and swimming pools, including the one at the YMCA are shut down until they are told they can reopen.
“We have closed our pools, hot tubs and steam rooms in order to help with conservation efforts in the city of Lethbridge,” said Jennnifer Petracek-Kolb from the YMCA. “Other than that, all of our programs and dryland programs are open as usual.”
.
The swimming pools at the University is also not operating until the water shortage is rectified.
Comments