City pools and arenas will closed Monday afternoon and will not reopen until further notice due to the threat of the spread of the COVID-19 virus.
The city made the announcement after a meeting with staff members in response to the provincial medical health officer's recommendation to cancel all gatherings of more than 50 people.
The closure affects the Prince George Aquatic Centre and Four Seasons Leisure Pool, as well as the city's six arenas - CN Centre, Rolling Mix Concrete Arena, and Kin 1, Kin 2 and Kin 3.
"On the arenas, most of the users are organizations like hockey and they had already started to cancel a number of their bookings anyway and it was determined it was in the best interest of the facilities to close them," said Rob Van Adrichem, the city's director of external relations.
"There really were very few bookings anyway."
The Prince George Rec Hockey Association was into the final week of its regular season with playoffs supposed to start next weekend but league executive member Tim Clough announced Thursday on the league's Facebook site the remaining games would be cancelled "for the foreseeable future."
Late last week, the Western Canadian ringette championships were cancelled, The four day event, March 25-28 would have occupied the Kin Centre and Rolling Mix Concrete rinks.
The three rinks at the Kin Centre were booked for the Prince George Aboriginal Youth Hockey Championships, which were to be held on April 3-5.
The one big event on the Aquatic Centre horizon over the next six weeks is the Prince George Barracudas Moose Meet long course event, set for April 24-26.
"For the pools, there had already been the announcement (Sunday) of the cancellation of all the swimming lessons and pool programs and I think after that announcement from the provincial health officer and the comments from the health minister as well, it really became apparent that the best course of action was to close those facilities," said Van Adrichem.
"You just make decisions that you think that are in the best interests of people with the best information that you have."
Tourism Prince George has closed its visitor centre on First Avenue and it will remain closed at least until March 30, when the situation will be reevaluated. Visitor information will be available online at www.tourismpg.com.
The city will now coordinate its ongoing delivery of civic operations and services through its Emergency Operations Centre. City staff will have several means to communicate with local residents, including the COVID-19 web page, www.princegeorge.ca/covid-19, and its social media channels, www.facebook.com/cityofpg and www.twitter.com/cityofpg.
People can sign up for media releases and emergency alerts by filling out an electronic form available at www.princegeorge.ca/subscribe.
