Todd Wickus, owner of a toy store on the square, recently suggested that all downtown businesses require masks and build a unified branding campaign around the policy. Twenty business owners signed on. But Mr. Wickus, who heads the downtown business association, said he tabled the idea because not enough businesses agreed.
John Kessenich, owner of a health- and natural-products store, opposed Mr. Wickus’s plan. He says he is already taking steps to keep people safe through “respectful distancing, personal hygiene” and promoting probiotics. “I don’t believe it’s a good thing to mandate that everybody wear a mask,” he said.
Ms. Burroughs, the hair stylist and a Trump backer, said she lost $12,000 in bookings under the governor’s stay-at-home order and more money in rents from other stylists who use her space. She thinks it was wrong that the state allowed big retailers to remain open while closing small businesses and places of worship.
“I don’t feel it was right to say who was essential and who was not,” she said. “I should be allowed to have a job and work. I don’t have another resource. Our livelihood depends on the income that we provide.