EAST LANSING, Mich. — At last night’s East Lansing City Council meeting, Council unanimously approved the adoption of a new emergency ordinance requiring compliance with public health orders.
Under the new ordinance, any person who violates a public health order issued by the State of Michigan, the Ingham County Health Department or the Mid-Michigan District Health Department (including health officers and directors) could receive a municipal civil infraction ticket, punishable by a fine of $500. The emergency ordinance will go into effect on Thursday, Oct. 15 and will remain in place until the end of 2020.
“This new ordinance provides our police officers with the ability to write tickets for public health violations, specifically for exceeding indoor and outdoor social gathering limits and all other public health orders that have been put into place to protect the health, safety and welfare of the East Lansing community,” said East Lansing Mayor Aaron Stephens.
“Given the recent increase in COVID-19 cases in our community and the upcoming MSU football season, this is an important tool for enforcement that we hope will encourage fans to cheer on the Spartans safely and responsibly,” said East Lansing City Manager George Lahanas. “It’s important that we all continue to do our part to slow the spread of COVID-19 in our community.”
Community members are reminded of the following public health and emergency orders:
- Outdoor social gatherings are currently restricted to no more than 10 people in parts of East Lansing. The restricted area stretches from the northern edge of the MSU campus to Burcham Drive and is bounded by Harrison Road to the west and Hagadorn Road to the east, including properties adjacent to those streets. Learn more.
- Outdoor social gatherings throughout the remainder of East Lansing and Ingham County are limited to 100 people or less. Learn more.
- Indoor social gatherings throughout Ingham County, including East Lansing, are limited to 10 people or less. Learn more.
- All social gatherings, indoors and out, must be designed to ensure that people from different households maintain a social distance of at least six feet.
- Masks are required when in any indoor public space and in outdoor public spaces where it is not possible to maintain six feet of distance or more from individuals who are not members of the same household. Learn more.
- Masks are required at all times, indoors and outside, in the boundaries of the East Lansing Downtown Development Authority district per an order issued by Mayor Stephens. Learn more.
This is not an all-encompassing list of public health orders. Additional orders can be viewed at www.michigan.gov/coronavirus, http://hd.ingham.org/ and https://www.mmdhd.org/novel-coronavirus/.
It’s also important for community members to note that as future public health orders are put into place, they can be enforced under this new emergency ordinance.