City of Janesville Clerk-Treasurer's Office closed after employee tests positive for COVID

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Jul. 29—JANESVILLE — The city of Janesville shuttered the Clerk-Treasurer's Office at City Hall and re-instituted a masking policy until further notice after an employee tested positive for COVID-19.

The news came Thursday afternoon after the city initially temporarily closed the clerk-treasurer's office earlier in the day.

The city initially gave no reason for the closure, and officials declined to give further details.

By mid-day Thursday, the city re-instituted a masking policy in city buildings and issued an updated statement that the clerk-treasurer's office would be "closed until further notice out of an abundance of caution after it was learned an employee had tested positive for COVID-19."

The office closure comes less than two days after the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new guidelines on public masking in the face of a rise in COVID cases around the country. The rise stems in part from the spread of newer variants of COVID-19, including the delta variant, the CDC says.

Over the last two weeks, Rock County has seen an uptick in new COVID cases, according to state Department of Health Services data. The data shows the county this week and last week showed periods of "high case activity."

The city clerk's office tends to have a larger volume of public foot traffic than other offices because it serves in part as a walk-up customer service center for residents who seek to pay city utility bills and request or fill out various city permit application forms in person.

City spokesperson Nick Faust indicated that as of Thursday afternoon, no other city offices were affected by the closure.

It's the first closure of any city office that's been prompted by an employee COVID infection since the pandemic's start in early 2020, Faust said.

Faust said the city in the wake of the illness has re-instituted a mask mandate for all employees inside all city buildings, regardless of whether or not employees have been vaccinated.

Faust said mandatory masking inside city buildings would take effect today. He said any member of the public attending city government meetings at City Hall will be required to wear a mask.

In June the city resumed holding public meetings at City Hall, and it lifted its in-house mask mandate earlier this year after the city reported the vast bulk of city workers had been fully vaccinated against COVID.

Faust said the closure of the city office affected came "out of an abundance of caution, and as a measure to allow workers in the clerk-treasurer's office time to get tested for the virus or monitor themselves for possible COVID symptoms.

Faust said the city made the decision to temporarily close the office "early Thursday morning." Other changes in COVID-19 protocols in city buildings rolled out throughout the day, he said.

The clerk-treasurer's office remains closed until further notice.

The county has a current COVID infection rate of about 90 positive cases per 100,000 people. Combined with an ongoing increase in the pace of new cases, the state health department now categorizes Rock County's burden of COVID infection to be "moderate."

That assessment comes as the county has seen the new number of people getting fully vaccinated taper from about 3,000 a week in mid-June to about 770 within the last week.

All told, about 57% of Rock County residents are fully vaccinated.

According to a release on Thursday morning, the city is asking residents to pay utility bills online. Others who seek various city application forms are being asked to access the forms on the city's website amid a sudden closure Thursday of the Clerk-Treasurer's Office.