Good Afternoon All,
I've heard from a great many of you over the past week or so and have had discussions with you about the lifting of the mask mandate this coming Monday, March 21/22. I know for our retailers and personal care service (hair & nail salons etc) members, in particular, that many of you would like to keep the masking protocols in place but are very concerned about potential backlash. You've asked me to see if there are any kind of safety nets that might protect you from these situations. I've reached out to our City contacts and unfortunately there really isn't any kind of protection once the mandate is lifted.
As business owners you all have the right to decide how you wish to do business - you can decide that anyone coming into your business must continue to be masked but.... that takes us right back to the issue of backlash. So here are a few suggestions that you might want to consider:
- you and your staff can continue to wear your masks
- you can keep your plexiglass barriers in place
- you can continue to have hand sanitizer available and suggest that customers use it upon entering your business
- if you do decide to ask customers to wear a mask then you may want to ensure that you have disposable masks available - some people may not have one with them
A number of you have also asked about current vaccine stats. Here are the numbers as of today:
Aged 12 & up: 55% have had a 3rd dose (90.8% have had 2 shots)
Aged 5 to 11: 31.4% have had a 2nd dose (55.3% have had 1 shot)
Hospitalization numbers continue to go down.
As always, if there is any other information that I can provide to help you please just let me know.
Thanks,
Susan