GREEN BAY, Wis. (NBC 26) — Masks have been required at Kavarna Coffeehouse for over a year now. Co-owner Mike Hastreiter says that rule will remain in place for now, even as Green Bay and De Pere'ss mask mandates expired.
"We've clearly taken the stance through the entire pandemic that we as business owners need to be safer, or are the ones taking it into our hands trying to help the community," Hastreiter said.
RELATED: Green Bay Metro requires masks after mandate expires
Many local ordinances are expiring without much pressure to renew as communities see significant vaccination rates. But without that government stance, Hastreiter says he faces blowback from customers who do not want to wear masks anymore.
"The one thing we always tell people when responding to those kinds of questions is for every person that is very unhappy about it, there's one person who's extremely happy and thankful that people are wearing masks," Hastreiter said. "So it does get contentious obviously, but if we all just remember it's about protecting our neighbors, we can get over it and do the right thing."
Other businesses, like Gallagher's Pizza, are choosing not to intervene.
Dr. Brad Burmeister practices emergency medicine at Bellin Health. He said that studies showed a quantifiable impact of having mask mandates in place.
"We knew that initially when they were considering first putting the mask mandates in place, we knew that somewhere between 10 and 20 percent of people in surveys that they would actually wear a mask should there be a regulatory requirement or a mandate in place, and they would not otherwise should that not be in place," Dr. Burmeister said.
As vaccinations and pandemic fatigue rise, Dr. Burmeister says that masks are still necessary to prevent the transmission of COVID-19 within our communities.
"We're in a position now where we have a significant number of people in our community who are vaccinated," Dr. Burmeister explained. "Particularly the high risk people, 65 and older, seem to be vaccinated and our hospitalizations seem to be really down – though I would caution that we are seeing people who are not vaccinated seem to be the really clear, predominant people who are coming to emergence departments and not doing well with COVID-19."
Without extending the mask mandate, the De Pere Health Department issued an advisory to recommending masking in various situations for everyone above age 5.
