WARMINGTON: No skating around social distancing concerns at Mississauga rink

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Why not just let them skate?

It was a question that dozens of people turned away on the first day of outdoor skating in Celebration Square at Mississauga City Hall had as they were turned away thanks to COVID-19 number limits.

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But the question was not just about the frustration of not being able to hit the ice — it was more on the hypocrisy of jamming people up into a cattle line waiting for several hours looking over ice that was basically barren while every social distancing rule was being broken by 10.

There were no social distancing standards.

In Mississauga and Peel Region they hand out tickets to people for skateboarding too close to each other or having parties or weddings.

But the chaos Friday night in Mississauga was created by the authorities. This is all on them.

Stuff happens and they’ll have to go back to the drawing board on how to do this better. Toronto’s Nathan Phillips Square set a pretty good protocol with how it’s handled it’s outdoor rink — calling for reservations online and also having an overflow line to let people in as the numbers allow.

Even if we weren’t in a pandemic, it didn’t look comfortable for the people waiting in this lineup. There was about 100 of them while there was only 60 on the ice.

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Talk about a gross misconduct. None of this was necessary.

There’s more than enough room on the ice to let everybody go out there. Many families left disappointed.

One of the problems is that they stop the skating at 9 p.m. instead of letting it go up until at least 10 p.m.

The other problem is that all these medical officers of health of close down all the restaurants and businesses in the area for doing none of what happened under their own nose at City Hall on this Friday night.

If they’re going to have people clustered in a cage line up like this one, then why not just open up all the restaurants, pubs and coffee shops?

Social distancing tickets should be written, not for the people who were in the lineup with no place to escape, but to Mayor Bonnie Crombie and Council and all of the staff management people behind this poor planning.

It’s only fair.

If there is zero tolerance for pubs and small stores for doing far less, then the same standard should be applied here.

Of course, double standards are the order of the day when it comes to authority, government officials and politicians during COVID-19 times.

Unlike all of the people who couldn’t get onto the ice Friday night, those who caused these violations will likely skate.

jwarmington@postmedia.com