The Southern Interior Local Government Association thinks casinos could be used as sites to distribute the COVID-19 vaccine.
Kamloops councillor and SILGA director at large Bill Sarai says the idea was brought up during a virtual meeting on Monday, and says the association is considering lobbying the provincial government to use those spaces.
SILGA includes 37 cities, towns, districts, villages and regional districts in southern B.C., from Lillooet to Golden and Osoyoos to Clinton and Clearwater.
“They’re a provincial agency. They’re clean. There’s plenty of parking. They’re well secure… And I think that would be an ideal location when we’re ready to roll out the vaccination, use those facilities. And that’s what the rest of SILGA will be doing as well,” Sarai says.
“And so when the rollout comes, instead of staff looking at the Sandman Centre and Memorial Arena and pushing users out, that we should be lobbying the provincial government. Every city, district, town in the province has either a bingo hall or a casino. We have two.”
Casinos in B.C. have been shut down since March 17 of last year, because of the pandemic, and there’s no word on when they could reopen.
City staff in Kamloops are hopeful casinos will open, in some form, by the fall, which governments have also indicated would be the earliest time that COVID-19 vaccines could be available for the general public.