Vaughan Mills, stores facing COVID-19-related fines for Black Friday

Vaughan Mills Shopping Centre was one of multiple businesses charged on Black Friday by York Region’s COVID-19 task force.

The mall is facing three fines of $750 for failure to comply with the Reopening Ontario Act and Section 22 of the Health Protection and Promotion Act.

Three other stores inside the mall, Cellicon, Designer Depot and Haight Ashbury, were also each separately fined $750.

The lineups started before dawn at Vaughan Mills on Friday, but there was physical distancing and shopper limit guidelines in place.

York Region remains in the “red zone” and avoided lockdown measures put in place in Peel Region and Toronto on Monday.

Another 145 COVID-19 cases were reported in York Saturday. The region has seen a total of 10,453 cases with 1,114 of those being active.

Retailers were urged Friday to avoid exposing people to COVID-19 by limiting the number of shoppers allowed both inside malls and individual stores and people were encouraged to shop online.