Ontario’s Ministry of Labour, Training and Skills Development is conducting education and compliance visits this week in Simcoe-Muskoka.
“These visits will help ensure that businesses follow public health guidelines to protect workers and the public from COVID-19,” officials with the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit (SMDHU) say. They explain the ministry will work with SMDHU and the police to visit businesses in the region to ensure they’re following the current COVID-19 protocols, specifically the requirement that some businesses need patrons over the age of 12 to show proof of vaccination.
The visits will focus on education, rather than enforcement.
Ensuring that businesses are checking customers’ proof of vaccination is the priority for the visits, but officials with the ministry will also check to see if safety plans are written and placed where staff and patrons can easily see them, that face masks are being used, and capacity limits are being followed. All of the requirements are listed as protective measures under the Reopening Ontario Act.
This is the first inspection blitz held locally since the vaccine certificate program came into effect on September 22nd. The ministry held multiple compliance visits over the summer before the province implemented the program.