Follow orders or stay home: Maple Ridge server fed up with daily mask confrontations

MAPLE RIDGE (NEWS 1130) — Staff at one Maple Ridge restaurant are pleading with people to be civil after a barrage of verbal insults over the mandatory mask order.

Julie didn’t want to give her last name and can’t say where she works, but says confrontations over masks are happening on a regular basis.

“Every day at least a couple of people are having completely having tantrums at the door,” she tells NEWS 1130.

She recalls one incident over the weekend when a man who refused to wear a mask wouldn’t stop badgering the restaurant’s pregnant manager about the policy.

“It went on, and on, and on and finally he spat on the floor as he was leaving. I think that everybody was so shocked they didn’t think to get their plate number or anything like that,” she says.

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Like most people during the pandemic, Julie says staff are feeling drained and they shouldn’t have to put up with the abuse on top of that.

“Be good to each other, people. If people don’t learn from this, they’re not going to learn from anything I think,” she adds.

Many of the employees are teenagers at their first jobs and they shouldn’t be scared coming to work, Julie says.

“These kids are 16, 17, they don’t have any way to stand up for themselves. It’s awful. I don’t know why anyone would blame them for a mask issue that shouldn’t be an issue at all,” she says.

“If you can’t abide by the rules, stay home in general whether it’s for food or anything else. These masks are put in place to help people out and keep us safe.”