ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - County Executive Sam Page made the announcement Wednesday morning that the stay-at-home order in St. Louis County is extended indefinitely.
Page says "mayors across the county are anxious and I've talked to more than 65 of them on helping to craft a path forward. Business leaders are also working with me on a way to design a safe process for getting more businesses open in our community and people back to work."
The County's previous stay-at-home order was scheduled to expire Wednesday at 11:59 p.m. The County is reporting 68 new cases of COVID-19 in the last 24 hours, for a total of 2,417. There have been 96 reported deaths in the county.
Page says the St. Louis County Health Department is also putting together guidelines to help businesses open in a safe way, with cleaning protocols, crowd size and social distancing.
Page is also working with the County parks director about a gradual reopening of parks, starting with trails, but says he'll have something to announce later this week.
Neighboring Franklin County will be reopening some businesses starting this Friday. County Presiding Commissioner Tim Brinker said golf courses, movie theaters, concert halls, gymnasiums, exercise and fitness studios, bowling alleys and skating rinks will be allowed to reopen, but will still have to follow social distancing guidelines from the state.
St. Charles County also says it's looking into relaxing COVID-19 restrictions, but County Executive Steve Ehlmann says it won't happen there until they see how reopening the economy works elsewhere.
The number of Missouri deaths statewide rose by 16 Tuesday to 215, according to Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering. The number of cases rose by 156 to 5,963.
Protesters gathered in Clayton and in Jefferson City on Tuesday, demanding the government begins to allow businesses to reopen. The "Reopen Missouri" protest ended at Parson's home with about 150-200 holding signs and shouting for the economy to be reopened.