State Officials Announce Plans for Reopening Restaurants and Dental Offices

LINCOLN - With some restrictions on restaurants and dental practices being lifted staring May 4th, state officials have outlined what the "new normal" will look like.

Restaurants in ten of Nebraska's 19 pubic health districts will be able to provide dine-in services as long as they remain at or below 50-percent capacity and parties are no bigger than six people.

Nebraska Restaurant Association Executive Director Zoe Olson says the the local restaurant industry is promising to do everything possible to make sure the dine-in experience is safe for guests, but she says that customers need to be responsible for the health of restaurant workers as well.

"The promise you are making to us is that you will not come into our dining rooms if you are showing any symptoms of COVID-19, if you have a fever, anything like that, because our staff is incredibly important to us and we need to keep them safe."

Additionally dental practices will be able to begin operating statewide on May 4th, and past president of the Nebraska Dental Association Dr. Ken Tusha explained that procedures will be different.

"Patients will have their temperature taken when they come in as well as go through a number of questions. And they may be sitting in their car when they're doing this. We may be talking to them on their cell phones. It's going to be a different world and a new normal."

The lifted restrictions for dine-in at restaurants will apply to 59 the counties that belong to one of these 10 health districts:

• Douglas County Health Dept.
• Sarpy Cass Dept. of Health and Wellness
• East Central District Health Dept.
• Four Corners Health Dept.
• Loup Basin Public Health Dept.
• North Central District Health Dept.
• Northeast Nebraska Public Health Dept.
• Panhandle Public Health District
• Southeast District Health Dept.
• Southwest Nebraska Public Health District