SALT LAKE CITY — Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall signed an executive order that will continue to require masks to be worn in city facilities.
All city employees will be required to wear masks inside city buildings and vehicles. Face coverings must also be worn by visitors to city facilities.
WATCH: Salt Lake Co. councilwoman wants to lift all county mask requirements
Despite Utah's "endgame" bill effectively ending mask mandates earlier this month, an executive order falls under Mendenhall's power as mayor.
“I’m committed to keeping our City team healthy, and ensuring the members of the public we interact with stay safe," said Mendenhall in a statement. "Our City’s transmission and vaccination data, coupled with the advice of the CDC to continue wearing masks indoors tells me that we need to keep doing what has worked – wearing masks.”
Mendenhall's executive order, which was signed Monday, allows for some exceptions for wearing masks:
- While actively eating or drinking, provided that the individual remains in place while eating or drinking;
- While alone or only with other members of the same household in an office, room, cubicle, vehicle, or similar enclosure;
- When communicating as or with an individual who is deaf or hard of hearing if the speaker wears a face shield or uses alternative protection such as a plexiglass barrier;
- When engaging in work authorized by the City where wearing a face mask would create a risk to the individual, as determined by government safety guidelines;
- When needed to confirm an identity
- While outdoors and maintaining a physical distance of at least six feet from any individual from a different household; and
- Children younger than three years old.
WATCH: COVID-19 'endgame' law terminates Moab area's mask mandate
The mask executive order will "remain in effect until otherwise amended or rescinded."