Governor Edwards has loosened Coronavirus restrictions

Lafayette parish bars and restaurants can now stay open and serve until two a-m after governor edwards ended the 11 p-m alcohol curfew.

News 1's princess jhane stepherson- lowry got to speak with the owner of wurst biergarten about what this means to him.

Princess jhane things seem to be positivley progressing for the state of louisiana as governor john bel edwards has recently announced that he will be loosening the restrictions for coronavirus for establishments like the one behind me, right here in downtown lafayette.

I spoke with the owner of wurst biergarten & food park - he says the news about capacity limits and alcohol curfew being lifted is bittersweet.

Guercio sot"when i heard the news, i's definitley a good thing, a bit anticlimactic for me."robert guercio says his business does't serve hard liquor so he shoul'nt have been classified as a bar in the first place.

Guercio sot "the problem we had is w're 3 open air and open air is safe and yet we were lumped in with all the brick and mortars and that made it extra frustrating."

The alcohol curfew started during the food par's busiest hours of operation setting sales back by a whopping 55% compared to sales in 2019 - guercio says he just was't ready.

Guercio sot"i had just gone through a buyout of two business partners two weeks prior to covid hitting so it came as a bit of a shock.

We made sure to tell all of our employees to file for unemployment due to reduced hours of work."

But now with the loosened restrictions guercio se's an influx of financial stability on the way.

Guercio sot"the word is definitley out that the wurst biergarten is all open air."in lafayette, princess jhane stepherson-lowry, news 15.

Thanks princess, guercio says h's thankful for the recent changes by the governor but says if it wer'nt for local leadership from lafayette consolidated government and lafayette city council more businesses woul've gone under.guercio adds that lcg added three new alcohol permits in late february of 2020 that allowed owners with board of health approved kitchens to apply for temporary restaurant conditional