Lansing, Mich. (WLNS)– Monday afternoon, Governor Gretchen Whitmer announced her plan to slowly re-open businesses throughout the state.
The “MI Safe Start Plan” will take into account various sectors of the economy, geographic and work-place risk, as well as health care capacity.
“In the coming weeks we’ll continue re-engaging sectors of our economy and putting more Michiganders back to work,” Governor Whitmer said.
Leaders of the Michigan Economic Recovery Council, or MERC said they’ve been working around the clock to study workforce data across the state, that will help guide the Governor in her decision making.
“The two key risk categories we’ve been evaluating are worker interaction and secondly workplace characteristics,” Wright Lassiter III of “MERC,” said.
Although state leaders continue to see an overall plateau of coronavirus cases, the Governor said if businesses open too soon there could be a spike.
Friday, the Governor announced a number of businesses, like landscaping and garden centers, could get back to work. While she has not made a formal announcement about which businesses will be included in the next phase of re-engagement, she mentioned a few that are considered lower risk.
“The first will be additional outdoor enterprises that we feel pose low risk. we’ll also be looking at residential and commercial construction. That industry, for example, will be one of the first sectors to return to work. We’re also carefully evaluating a number of industrial sectors,” Gov. Whitmer said.
Tyler Davis, Owner of Luxe Development Group, LLC said his company is ready to be a part of that first phase.
“I think that commercial construction being the first move in the industry would be good to gauge how we’re doing,” Davis said.
Davis said residential jobs pose a slightly higher risk than commercial, but that overall, there’s still much less interaction compared to other industries. Unlike some businesses that have been completely shut down for the past 6 weeks, Davis said his employees have safety measures in place for the essential jobs they are doing. Since they already have that part figured out, he said it would simply continue when his company is allowed to resume operations fully.
“We’re still going to continue following those measures until we know for a fact that there’s not gonna be a second wave,” Davis said.
State leaders have also stressed the importance of continuing social distancing and safety measures as they work towards an economic restart.
“I am confident, that not one of us wants to see a second wave,” Gov. Whitmer said.
