Twin Cities venues prepare to enforce vaccine-or-test mandate at ticketed events

When the Timberwolves take on the Utah Jazz on Sunday, it will be the first time fans must either show their COVID-19 vaccination card or show a negative test to get inside.

Target Center is following a mandate from the city of Minneapolis.

“In an effort to get guests into the building as quickly as possible, we are expanding our door times. Where we would traditionally ask guests to come within the first hour, we are going to expand that to 90 minutes,” said Amy Rahja, with Target Center.

Roughly 30 additional staff members have been hired to help with the change.

And just in case, Target Center will offer COVID testing on site.

“We are working with a company that provides nurses who will be there to provide tests,” Rahja said. “There will be a fee, but we feel it is important to provide an option for our guests who for whatever reason aren’t vaccinated or couldn’t get a test in advance, or for some reason didn’t know.”

On the University of Minnesota campus, Thursday night’s men’s basketball game will be the first event requiring the new COVID protocols.

And after that, it will be every event on campus with more than 200 people in attendance.

“Certainly we look at some of our larger ticketed events — sports like men’s and women’s basketball and hockey — it will impact track and field events, swimming, tennis as well,” said Mike Wierzbicki with University of Minnesota athletics.

With multiple venues to man, the university has also increased staff.

“It will really depend mostly on our entry points,” Wierzbicki said. “When we have more entry points like at Williams arena, it might take more staff versus Ritter Arena for women’s hockey games, where we have one main entry point.”

First Avenue says all of its music venues already had the COVID policies in place, so there’s no major change. But across the river in St. Paul, where the Minnesota Wild season is in full swing, the rules also apply.

The policy remains in effect in St. Paul through February, until further notice in Minneapolis and until Feb. 9 at the University of Minnesota.