March 24, 2025
News - Sauk Valley
News - Sauk ValleyAgriculture | Sauk Valley NewsAlerts | Sauk Valley NewsBreaking | Sauk Valley NewsBusiness | Sauk Valley NewsCrime & Courts | Sauk Valley NewsCrime Brief | Sauk Valley NewsEducation | Sauk Valley NewsGovernment | Sauk Valley NewsLocal News | Sauk Valley NewsNation & World | Sauk Valley NewsPolice Reports | Sauk Valley NewsProperty Transfers | Sauk Valley NewsRecords - Sauk ValleyState | Sauk Valley News
News

Oregon SuperValu reopens today after COVID-19 outbreak

By Jeff Helfrich
Image 1 of 2

Signs posted on the entrance Oregon SuperValu inform customers that masks must be worn and social distancing guidelines must be followed. The store reopened today after being shut down for a week because of a COVID-19 outbreak among the staff. (Earleen Hinton)

OREGON – The Oregon SuperValu reopened today after a COVID-19 outbreak prompted the Ogle County Health Department to close it a week ago today.

The health department has half of the testing results back, made recommendations on cleaning and formulated a plan to send employees back to work, Administrator Kyle Auman said Monday.

Tuesday evening, owners Jim and Kim Kaufman announced their plans to reopen on Facebook. Because of a shortage of workers, they have reduced their hours to 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.

"Only employees who have negative test results with all of the members of their households also testing negative are allowed to return to work, which means we will only have a partial staff for a few more days,” the Facebook post said.

Hours will be increased as more staff returns.

A lot of produce had to be thrown out, Kim Kaufman said in the post.

“If you see out of stocks on certain items, know that we will be working hard to order those products and get them back on the shelf ASAP. We expect our shelves to be back to what you usually expect at SuperValu by next week.”

Customers now are required to wear masks. at the store. An employee will be stationed at the door to remind all shoppers of this OCHD-mandated regulation.

The OCHD found out about the COVID-19 cases at SuperValu through its contact tracing process, Auman said.

On July 5, the OCHD learned of two cases there, and later found additional cases linked to the store and mandated the closure, which initially it planned only to recommend.

SuperValu is the second business closed by the health department because of a COVID-19 outbreak. Rochelle Foods, a food processing plant employing about 900, was closed in April for 2 weeks.

“This isn’t even comparable to Rochelle Foods,” Auman said. “It’s easy to get people tested fast and most were easy to work with.”

Those two businesses aren’t the only Ogle County businesses that have had employees test positive, just the only ones that had to be mandated to close, Auman said.

He has heard rumors of recent partial closings at Woods Equipment and E.D. Etnyre and Co. in Oregon because of COVID-19 cases, but nothing was mandated or recommended by the OCHD, Auman said.

Mandated closure “depends on so many different factors,” Auman said. “People are moving all over the store at SuperValu. At those other places, they may be confined to one machine. It’s a whole host of things, and the amount of risk a business poses to the county. A store is a large risk.”

The health department gets hundreds of COVID-19-related complaints a day, which are handled by 13 regular staff members and 3 or 4 others. The department has then communicated with several local businesses as well as corporate headquarters.

“We’re doing the best we can,” Auman said. “Facebook, email and phone calls. We try to prioritize the ones with the highest risk. We try to follow up on every one. It’s been overwhelming. Our phones ring off the hook.”