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COVID-19 guidelines issued for haunted attractions

RIVERSIDE, Ohio — Haunted houses are designed to get visitors screaming, but Public Health is concerned about that type of activity spreading COVID-19.

News Center 7 caught volunteers helping to get the Riverside Jaycees Haunted House ready for next Friday and because of a COVID-19 there are a number of changes they have had to make in order to keep people safe from the virus. For example, placing markers in designated areas to make sure people keep their distance and other precautions.

Riverside Jaycees Haunted Castle of Carnage and Trail has been scaring people for the last 35 years.

“Over the years we went from having the house to the trail and adding those things to our haunt,” Julie Denning said who is the marketing coordinator.

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The non-profit depends on the haunt season to help the community.

Denning said, “If our haunt didn’t open this season, we would not be able to help the 80 plus children we help at Christmas.”

“The changes are going to be pretty massive,” Denning said. “We are actually putting up plastic barriers in between each line. So, there will be no cross contamination between lines and our guests.”

Organizers with the haunt said they will be sanitizing all high-touch areas each house and masks will be required for all the guests and actors.

According to Denning, “They will be wearing an approved face covering underneath that to protect our customers.”

The requirements will be the same for the Terror Maze in Springfield.

“Everyone is required to wear a mask, the actors and the people coming through,” said Paul Deady, Terror Maze owner.

The Terror Maze opens on October 2. “We work with the health department and they have given us guidelines.” said Deady.

News Center 7 spoke with Public Health Dayton Montgomery County over it’s concerns with a specific activity, screaming.

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Supervisor Dan Suffoletto said, “It has been found people singing, yelling or talking loudly that kind of activity can spread COVID even further. We discourage any kind of that activity at a haunted house.”

However, haunted houses are a business built on screams.

News Center 7′s Monica Castro asked “how do you limit that kind of activity?”

Deady said, “All the actors have masks on underneath the regular mask. Some of my best scarers are more than six feet away.”

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine did not put a ban on haunted houses but recommended that owners cancel or that people avoid them.

Public Health said if people must go to a haunted house or event “Those type of situations are similar to any type of event so we want to make sure people are spread out as much as possible. You don’t have large groups of people. We need to make sure people are wearing their masks.”

Before each event runs, temperature checks will be conducted on all volunteers who work. Plus after each night, they sanitize all the masks and costumes.

Monica Castro

Monica Castro

I've been with Cox Media Group Ohio since 2018. I come to WHIO with more than 8 yrs of reporting experience. I previously worked at KAKE News in Wichita, Kansas for 4.5 years. During my time there I covered anything from politics, natural disasters, crime and sports.

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