Around 250 people arrived for a rally to protest business closures in Downtown Fresno last month. Photo by Donald A. Promnitz

A crowd of Fresno County residents and small business owners gathered in Downtown Fresno this weekend to protest the latest lockdown and curfew orders issued by Gov. Gavin Newsom.

The rally was held in front of the Fresno County Department of Public Health on Saturday. Around 250 people were in attendance.

The event was put on by Open Central California Safely, a coalition of local business owners seeking to ease Covid-19 restrictions. Co-founder Lewis Everk was one of the their keynote speakers, who criticized not only the restrictions, but also the 10 p.m. curfew.

 

 

They called on Gov. Newsom to allow businesses to operate.

“We’re hearing, we’re fielding, we’re taking these phone calls of people that are saying that, ‘we can’t take it anymore — this is it for us,’” Everk said. “But I think so many people are defeated. So many people have thrown in the towel and given up. And I think I’m here today — my personal interest to be here today is for you guys to give me the strength to keep fighting.”

Fresno County re-entered purple tier last week along with the rest of the Central Valley.