Macon Reporter

Even as she concedes some businesses may never bounce back from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Decatur Mayor Julie Moore Wolfe says Illinois leaders are doing the only thing they can do in enacting restrictions aimed at slowing the spread of the virus.

"Unfortunately, we are going to lose some of these businesses and my heart breaks for these people," Moore Wolfe said during a recent appearance on NowDecatur’s Byers &Co.  "(But) I don’t want to lose any more people, and that’s what our choice is."

As of May 26, Illinois reported 113,195 confirmed cases of the coronavirus, including 4,923 deaths. Macon County, however, has confirmed just 188 cases of COVID-19.

Even before Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced plans to extend the stay-at-home order that only allows businesses deemed by the government as essential to fully operate, Moore Wolfe conceded almost everyone has grown tired of all the new rules and restrictions.

"We're all frustrated," she said. "We want to get back to normal."

But the mayor adds the only way to do that is for people to continue to practice the social-distancing guidelines that are part of the governor’s order. Moore Wolfe argues people following the guidelines as well as they have to the point is part of the reason the governor was able to loosen some of the restrictions in his updated stay-at-home decree.

"Here’s the deal: We’re being given an opportunity to slowly open back up," she said. "If we cheat this and it takes a turn the other way, the governor has every right and ability to shut us all down again if we can’t grow up and be grownups about this."