The province is moving into Step 3 of BC’s 4 Step Restart Plan tomorrow (Thursday), which allows casinos to open up with certain restrictions.
Some of those restrictions include allowing only 50% of the venue’s total capacity and 50% of gaming stations permitted to open.
Amanda Chandler, Marketing Manager at Treasure Cove says that they’re preparing for the 9 am reopening on Thursday, and staff are excited to return to work.
All of the staff at Treasure Cove that were working prior to the pandemic have been offered their jobs back, and about 80% have accepted the offer.
However, Chandler says that while the staff are ready to return to work, there are still some unknowns when it comes to operations.
“It’s been extremely hectic, it’s honestly day-by-day and hour-by-hour sometimes as far as waiting for the government or BCLC to give us direction on what’s coming up,” she explained.
However, with the information provided by the government and BCLC, there have been some adjustments made in the casino.
“Our gaming floor is now spread out a further distance across the facility, we have plexiglass partitions up in between all of the slot machines, plexiglass is now on our tables, basically all public spaces will have plexiglass separating customers from our staff,” Chandler added.
She says that the facility won’t look the exact same as it was before the pandemic, and they’re starting with opening up slots and table games.
Bingo will also return on July 5th with reduced games and slots are open from 9 am until 2 am, while table games including Blackjack and Fast Action Poker are available from 1:00 pm until 1:00 am.
BCLC’s updated Casino and Community Gaming Centre Enhanced Health & Safety Measures report includes a few measures including mandatory mask wearing for both staff and players.
Additionally, the report says at least two meters of space is required between gambling equipment and new training is required for casino staff.
According to BCLC, community poker will not be offered upon reopening but some casinos may offer some poker variant games such as Texas Hold’em.
Chandler adds that based on their social media response, they’re expecting plenty of visitors this weekend.
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