Vaccinated or not? Here’s how one big company is dividing its Charlotte-area office
Another big Charlotte-area company has announced new mask rules for employees following a spike in COVID-19 cases due to the highly contagious delta variant. And it is holding separate hours for vaccinated and unvaccinated people in the office.
Red Ventures reopened its headquarters in Fort Mill, S.C., on Monday on a voluntary basis. None of the Internet marketing company’s 3,500 worldwide employees will be required to return to an office this year, Red Ventures Chief Operating Officer Tim Kullick said in a statement.
Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urged even fully vaccinated people to resume wearing masks in public areas indoors. That’s because new research shows fully vaccinated people can transmit the delta COVID-19 variant, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said.
And Mecklenburg County is considered an area of high community transmission of COVID-19, the most serious level of coronavirus transmission, according to the CDC COVID-19 tracker.
At Red Ventures, the company will hold vaccinated and unvaccinated hours at the reopened office for its workers.
Any employee who work from the office Monday through Thursday during normal working hours must be fully vaccinated, Kullick said.
Unvaccinated employees can work from the office after hours Monday through Thursday and all day on Fridays — but anyone working at the office during those times must wear a mask, regardless of vaccination status.
“Our hope is that we can loosen this requirement in the future as the pandemic dissipates,” Kullick said.
Roughly 1,400 Red Ventures employees are based in the Charlotte area.
Other NC mask mandates
Other Charlotte-area companies issued mask requirements on Monday too.
Both Duke Energy and Lowe’s will require all employees to wear masks indoors, the companies told the Observer Monday.
And the requirements follow vaccination mandates from hospital systems Atrium Health and Novant Health, along with other hospital systems across the state.
Charlotte hospitals announce mandatory COVID vaccine requirement for all employees
Atrium Health will require all workers — including remote workers, physicians, medical residents, faculty, fellows, trainees, contractors, medical staff, students, temporary workers and volunteer staff — to get vaccinated or have an approved medical or religious exemption by Oct. 31.
And Novant Health will require the same for all of its employees, contractors, vendors and students by Sept. 15.
State and local spikes
The local business mandates comes as Mecklenburg sees a spike in COVID-19 cases, testing positivity rate and hospitalization.
And on Monday, the county announced it reached a grim milestone: 1,000 Mecklenburg residents have died from COVID-19. “If you have not yet gotten the vaccine, please get it now,” county Public Health Director Gibbie Harris said in a statement. “It will help protect you, your family, your friends and our community.”
The state has seen an increase in coronavirus trends as well.
In fact, the number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 across NC has more than doubled in just two weeks, state Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mandy Cohen said last Thursday. That marks the fastest increase in hospitalizations since the pandemic started, she added.
And Gov. Roy Cooper said he would begin requiring all state employees at cabinet agencies to show proof of vaccination. Unvaccinated employees would be required to take regular COVID-19 tests and wear masks, Cooper said. That requirement will begin Sept. 1.
And he recommended other businesses implement the same requirement.
But Cooper stopped short of announcing a new mask mandate last week, leaving the option for local governments.
Although Harris publicly encouraged mask-wearing last week, she did not say she would pursue a new countywide mask mandate.
“I am not ready to issue a (mask) mandate at this point,” Harris said. “I would like to think that our community is going to step up.”
