In light of the national declaration of a national emergency and what is likely to be a quickly evolving issue for the Transylvania County community and economy, the Alliance would like to offer some useful online local, state, and federal resources specifically built for the business community. These resources can help you and your businesses prepare your employees and workplaces as the community and nation work to address this crisis. As a rural community our strength is our established relationships, ability to be flexible, and robust network of public and private institutions that include our local department of health, Mission Hospital campus, urgent care and medical facilties, and of course our highly trained and dedicated health and public safety professionals. The Alliance is thankful for this existing network and our hope is to support these professionals however possible to help mitigage the impact that this situation may cause.
With your business interests in mind our staff will take precautions to limit unncessary travel and interaction with large groups. This inlcudes taking steps to revise our external marketing and attraction efforts to limit our exposure and unknowingly putting our local partners at risk. When possible our staff and board will be working to implement creativity to reduce face-to-face meetings with you. This will include taking advantage of technology, video conferencing, and other ideas to reduce face-to-face contact. Should you have questions, ideas or see opportunities for improved response to this issue please feel free to call our office directly. We are happy to help be a source of idea sharing on how best to mitigate the overall impact to our economy while also fullfilling our obligation to public health. As part of this protocol our office number and individual extensions have been rerouted to our mobile numbers. We also have cancelled our March industrial roundtable event and will work to reprogram this opportunity, potentially taking advantage of video/teleconferencing technology .
Leading our local response to this crisis includes various departments within Transylvania County government. While we have not yet seen any confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Western North Carolina, Transylvania County Government has launched a custom webpage which they will be using to disseminate information relevant to COVID-19. This site includes a message from the Chair of the Board of Commissioners and an update to citizens issued on 3/13/20. This webpage will be updated on a weekly basis at minimum to help provide members of the community relevant updates.
Alliance Cancelled Upcoming Event:
Industrial Roundtable Breakfast Meeting: Cancelled. Next Meeting Scheduled May 21 (Location, Time and Additional Event Information to Follow)
Key Common Prepardness & Workplace Management Practices:
- Actively encourage sick employees to stay home.
- Seperate sick employees upon arrival and send home immediately.
- Emphasize respiratory etiquette and hand hygiene by all employees.
- Perform routine environmental cleaning.
- Advise employees before traveling to take extra precautions and monitor relevant online resources i.e. Center for Disease Control.
- Reduce unneccessary face-to-face contact when appropriate.
Other Relevant Resources for Businesses:
Mission Health Regarding Coronavirus (COVID-19)
Transylvania Public Health COVID-19 Updates
NC Department of Health & Human Services: COVID-19: Business and Employers
