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(KNSI) – A bill that would give business owners the power to create and put into place their own COVID-19 safety guidelines to stay open outside of the governor’s executive orders passed its first-floor debate.

The bill, authored by Senator Andrew Matthews, would give businesses the authority to create and put into place their own COVID-19 safety preparedness plans to open safely outside of Governor Tim Walz’s executive orders. He says business owners have customers and staff with different needs and want to do what works best.

Matthews believes that Walz ruling by executive order is taking the peoples’ voice out of the equation, explaining, “He has kept these emergency powers up for the last year here. This has been one person calling all the shots making all the decisions saying if you can be open this much if you can be open this much if you have to be shut down, and one person does not get to have that kind of power under our Constitution. So senate file one is going to be a bill to try to take it away from him.”

Last March, Governor Walz ordered all non-essential businesses plus in-person dining closed at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. Businesses reopened in May but were ordered closed again in November.

Matthews, a Republican, says he knows there are other Democrats that know, “deep down in the back of their mind that this is not the way we should be governing, and we’re giving them another opportunity to see if there are any that will do the right thing, regardless of which party’s in the governor’s office.

The Democratic governor has said he is open to working with Republicans to end the state of emergency declaration.

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