As most of the rest of the state's dine-in restaurants and entertainment venues wait for the state to say they can reopen, some of Michigan's casinos are making plans to open their doors – including Battle Creek's FireKeepers Casino Hotel.

'People will wonder why we are going against the state order. We are not, we are just applying it a little differently,' said FireKeepers CEO Kathy George as the casino was prepping the grounds with new safety measures on Thursday, ahead of the official reopening on Monday.

'The governors of many states have said certain business are essential to their government and to make their world work for them. As you know, any tribe is a sovereign nation and have their own government,' she said. 'Not that we hold any of those decisions against anybody, we have said we are an essential business to the tribe, the tribe needs the resources that are created through FireKeepers for the well being of the entire tribe.'

The Battle Creek casino is opening with several new safety procedures and guidelines to protect its customers and its employees. On Thursday, there were several training sessions going on. Employees had their temperatures taken as they arrived in the building and the casino floor was getting prepped for social distancing. There is a soft opening scheduled for this weekend by invitation only to test safety measures, with the general public allowed in starting at 11 a.m. Monday.

'We are always looking at how to take care of our employees and our guests,' George said. 'So we worked with the health department, the CDC and also some other casinos that have opened up in other parts of the country and asked what worked well, what didn't work well, what can we tweak. So we are at a point where we can keep our employees and our guests healthy and have some fun along the way.'

Firekeepers Casino. All in all, the casino features a total of 5,300 “slot machines” in addition to a variety of virtual table games, keno and video poker. Slots With thousands of the latest slot machines, including progressives, it’s a sure bet that we have your favorite games. We are always introducing new and exciting slots on the main gaming floor and at our Slot Palace which both include a high limit area.

George added that there was an excitement level from staff and employees to be able to be one of the first venues to reopen and bring some form of normalcy back to Battle Creek.

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'We are really excited to be able to bring back most of the employees off of furlough and be able to get ready to service the community and keep doing what we do,' George said. 'So the plan is, we are going to do things safely and keep everyone's health in mind. We are ready for everyone to come in and have some fun. I think people are ready to have some fun and I think they need it.'

Bill Broderick can be reached at bbroderi@battlecreekenquirer.com or 269-966-0678. Follow him on Twitter: @billbroderick

This article originally appeared on Battle Creek Enquirer: FireKeepers CEO: Casino reopening because 'we are an essential business to the tribe'