Two businesses located above the Bowmanstown municipal office will have their April and May rents waived.

Borough council decided during a brief meeting Tuesday that Carbon Builders Association and a photography studio, both located atop the town’s building on Ore Street, would not have to pay two months rent.

As nonessential businesses, they were made to close in mid-March due to the global coronavirus pandemic.

Council also extended the discount period for borough taxes until Aug. 31, and waived trash and sewer services penalties during April and May.

Pennsylvania is still under the red phase of Gov. Tom Wolf’s three-part planned reopening of the state, but come Friday, 24 counties will move to the yellow.

In those regions, the stay-at-home order will be lifted, and many businesses will be allowed to open up to customers.

But Carbon County won’t be one of them. Though the county’s running total of COVID-19 cases remained under 200 Wednesday, it’s surrounded by areas with much higher case counts; Lehigh has over 3,000, Monroe 1,100 and Schuylkill, 400.

The novel coronavirus has infected nearly 52,000 people in Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Department of Health reports.

More than 3,000 have died.