Covid-19: Folks in Wesley Chapel are trying to keep their distance
Continued from page 1.
Social distancing is the norm in Wawa and pretty much everywhere. (Photo: Charmaine George)
realistic timeline, and most are readying
to hunker down for a month or
two longer.
“The best-case scenario from what
I understand is May 8,” says Brass Tap
owner Jeff Martin. “But, I don’t think
that’s going to happen.”
Because Wesley Chapel is an area
with a high concentration of small
businesses — many of which have been
experiencing boom times over the past
few years due to the area’s tremendous
growth — coronavirus fears are likely
to strike a harsher blow.
But, no one really seems to know
where this headed, except for uncharted
territory.
“There are a lot of unknowns, and
that is really the scary part,” says Hope
Kennedy, the CEO of the 700-member
North Tampa Bay Chamber of
Commerce. “I’m not sure we’ve gotten
to the (worst) of this. Once we do,
we can get into recovery mode.”
Pasco School District superintendent
Kurt Browning. “It really has turned
the school district on its heels…but
a tip of the hat to the teachers and
administrators for stepping up and digging
in to find out how this works.”
Not only did schools hand out
roughly 15,000 devices to accommodate
students for distance learning, it
also already has distributed more than
110,000 meals for students.
Originally a daily distribution, the
district is now providing breakfast and
lunch meals for the whole week on
Tuesdays. The day of the first Tuesday
distribution — on March 31— 80,680
meals were provided to families via
drive-through lanes of 25 schools, including
New River and Quail Hollow
elementary schools.
Tuesday food service will continue
through April.
Local businesses, however, are
finding survival to be much more difficult,
especially those who don’t have
a business that can transition to offer
its services online.
Social distancing is currently the
best defense against coronavirus, according
to medical experts, but it’s
“These are unprecedented
times
and I don’t think
anybody, no matter
your age, unless you
lived through the
Great Depression,
has gone through
anything like this.”
— Mike Moore,
Pasco County
also the antithesis to small business
success, especially for those in the service
industry like hair and nail salons,
small stores or studios and restaurants.
“It’s pretty stressful,” said James
Serrano, who owns Pinot’s Palette in
Wesley Chapel, a small art-and-wine
studio that specializes in group painting
events.
Those that can’t remain open can
only hope that the stay-at-home order
expires in 30 days.
However, no business owners
we talked believed that 30 days was a
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