Judge Tells UP Cafe To Close Or Else

A tiny little coffee shop and restaurant in Calumet is now covered by a judicial restraining order telling the owners not to open for business.  Calumet is up near the tip of the Keweenaw Peninsula at the northwestern end of the Upper Peninsula. The state took its complaint however to a judge in Ingham County, near the state capitol. The state claims it did that for administrative purposes. Critics say the state stayed close to home in Lansing since it would have a hard time finding a Judge in the UP that would support the closing order.

The tiny Cafe Rosetta appears to be the first in Michigan to be hit with such a court order. Most other actions against restaurants bucking the Governor’s closings have been done administratively through the Health and Human Services Department or local county health departments.

The state went to Circuit Court Judge Wanda Stokes in Ingham County to plead its case against the cafe. The cafe has already been cited for remaining open in defiance of state closing orders by the state health and human services department. It was also hit with a cease and desist and license suspension order by the state Agriculture Department. But still, the owners continue to serve the residents of the small town of Calumet, with a population of about 12-hundred.

The Order from Judge Stokes carries a bit more legal weight than the earlier administrative orders. But owners of the cafe vow to stay open and fight the state, much like Owosso Barber Karl Manke who won the support of the Michigan State Supreme Court to say open and earn a living in spite of closing orders from Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer.

The cafe has a donation page set up on its website and comments posted to the cafe's social media accounts are mostly supportive. It is just one of the dozens of eating establishments around Michigan openly defying the Governor’s virus closing orders. It’s creating a real issue for the state from both a public relations standpoint, as well as an administrative controls position. But the state remains steadfast claiming the cafe poses an imminent and substantial endangerment to public health.