LEWISTON – It’s masks off in most public settings in Maine as of Monday, but not all businesses and their employees are so keen to leave them behind.

The state dropped its mask mandate, marking the first time since last April that all Mainers, vaccinated or not, can forgo masks in public settings. The mask mandate remains in effect for all individuals over the age of 5 in indoor settings at schools and child care facilities.

Gov. Janet Mills issued an executive order May 19 repealing her previous mandates and updating the state guidance from the week prior that said only vaccinated people could unmask. The new order allows everyone, regardless of vaccination status, to take off their masks indoors and outdoors.

State health officials said they suggest unvaccinated people should still wear masks indoors, but it is no longer a requirement. It is up to businesses, however, to decide if they want to impose their own masking and physical distancing requirements.

Forage Market will continue to ask staff and customers to mask up.

“We’re excited to see that science is working. We’re excited to see, you know, life is going to move on,” Lewiston store manager Phoebe Abner said Monday. “But ultimately, we’re still being safe.”

She called the 180 Lisbon St. location a “hub for our community,” and said the decision to maintain mask requirements was out of “respect” for the staff and Forage’s patrons.

Around the corner at Simones’ Hot Dog Stand, there were no masks in sight among employees and lunchgoers Monday afternoon.

Linda Simones said she thinks patrons are happy about the end to mask requirements.

“I think that there will be people that will continue to wear them, whatever they feel comfortable (with),” she said.

She and her husband, Jimmy, are third-generation owners of the lunch spot on Chestnut Street. They’re not asking employees to verify if they’ve been vaccinated before they unmask, Linda said. She and her husband have both gotten their shots.

“Now you just have to make sure your teeth are flossed,” Linda joked.

Mogadishu Store owner Shukri Abasheikh said it hasn’t always been easy to get patrons of her store on Lisbon Street to wear masks.

“It’s good to me,” she said of the new rules.

Larry Duprey, who’s been working at Orphan Annie’s Antiques in Auburn for 26 years, put a sign on the door that says unvaccinated people need to don their masks before entering.

“If we have usually six or more people in, then we’ll ask people to mask,” Duprey said. And if just one or two people come in and they’re not wearing masks, he said he’s not going to ask them to verify they’re vaccinated.

“They can just lie and say they had it,” but usually people are thoughtful when they come in, Duprey said.

The transition to new rules has not been so smooth at other places.

Employees at Bull Moose, the Maine music chain, have expressed their discontent at what some have said were a mishandling of safety protocols throughout the pandemic.

Hannah Hodges, a head clerk at the Lewiston location, said Monday that management has given all locations a “two-week grace period” where individual stores can still require employees and customers to wear masks but after that, stores cannot enforce a mask requirement, she said.

“I’m in, luckily, one of the locations that my manager has decided to let us keep it for two weeks,” she said.

But after working at the store for three years and being one of the few employees at that location that stuck around throughout the pandemic, Hodges said she’s putting in her two-week notice this week.

She said “we were just thrown out there,” when the store reopened in June 2020.

“It’s scary, (we) definitely aren’t under the impression that we have any power here,” Hodges said. “It was definitely a performative thing to give us, you know, as if it was a gift, two weeks of being able to require (masks) still.”

Coming in to work Monday, Hodges said she was “fully expecting to get fired today,” after speaking to the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram about upper management’s decision to close the Salem, New Hampshire, location.

Current and former employees, including Hodges, told the Press Herald that Bull Moose laid off workers at the Salem location who protested the company’s decision to lift mask requirements for everyone.

Bull Moose Chief Financial Officer Chris Brown confirmed in a statement Saturday afternoon that it had shut down the Salem location, but denied that it had anything to do with face coverings.

“I’m actually the only employed person still at Bull Moose who has spoken up about it,” Hodges said. “I know I’m not going to be the last one.”

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