Windsor business owners 'understand' why a Tillsonburg golf course reopened

Business owners talk lockdown frustration Small business owners understand how frustration led to a Tillsonburg golf course opening illegally. CTV Windsor’s Michelle Maluske reports.

Windsor, Ont. — The general manager of a golf course, a barber and a gym owner all "get" why the Bridges at Tillsonburg defied Ontario’s current COVID-19 restrictions and allowed golfers on Saturday.

“It’s not for me to decide if it was right or wrong,” says Dave Deluzio, general manager of Roseland Golf and Curling Club.

Deluzio says he understands why the course made the decision, because those in the industry believe it’s a safe sport during the pandemic.

“Over 25 million rounds were played in the last year, in Ontario, with no reports of anyone contracting COVID at a golf course.” Says Deluzio.

William Thibodeau, who’s barber shop in Windsor, Ont. has been closed for weeks, can appreciate why business owners make these kind of tough choices.

“I know a lot of other businesses, restaurants that are following suit,” he says. “It doesn’t make me angry, because I completely understand.”

Thibodeau says he knows of some businesses that have gone underground in this third lockdown, although declined to identify them.

“I don’t know how much longer they expect us just to hold on without making the move like these golf courses made and say ‘I gotta do what’s best for my business, now.’”

“Some of these people have put their life into these businesses so I completely understand,” says Mike Bates, owner of Refine Fitness Studio.

Bates can understand a golf course reopening, because it’s outside and golfers were kept physically distant.

Besides, he says, golf courses only have that one revenue stream to stay afloat, where gyms like his, can transition to online training.

“Every business is affected differently by this,” Bates says. “We’re not all in this the same way absolutely not.”