Videos from a large party that took place Monday evening (March 29) at Charley Victoria’s restaurant are circulating online, leaving many people concerned.
Videos posted to social media and sent to Glacier Media show a large crowd of people dancing in the packed restaurant and on tables, and it appears no one was wearing masks or social distancing.
Charley Victoria’s is located at Big White but is privately owned and operated. Glacier Media spoke with Big White vice president Michael J. Ballingall who says the resort is “disgusted” and they called RCMP at the time of the event to get it shut down.
“We’re incredibly upset by what we’ve seen,” he says.
“If we can identify any staff members that work for us, their jobs will be terminated. At seven-o-clock we called the police. This is an extreme violation of everything that we’ve been trying to do all year long. This is in violation of the provincial health order.”
Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry announced Monday afternoon that all in-house dining at restaurants will be prohibited until April 19, as a result of surging COVID-19 cases in the province.
“Yesterday was a hard day for a lot of people including the restaurant industry. There's a lot of people in the industry that were laid off yesterday because their restaurants were closed today and so some of these people might have worked for us Monday at noon, and they didn’t work for us Monday at four-o-clock.”
Because it’s believed many of the people in the videos do not work for Big White, there is limited actions that the resort can take going forward. The ski hill closes for the season on April 11.
Glacier Media has reached out to Charley Victoria's and has yet to receive a response.
