Village of Pemberton transitions to a full reopening

With Step 3 of the B.C. Restart Plan already a month into action, the Village of Pemberton (VOP) is now looking at ways to transition from the COVID-19-specific safety plans to a general Communicable Disease Prevention Plan.

According to Emily White, human resources coordinator for the Village, this means Pemberton will be able to “flex between several measures” including physical distancing, mask use and occupancy limits, she told council at its regular meeting July 27.

“We’ve also transitioned away from mandatory physical distancing to an approach where we’re asking staff to be mindful of those working in close proximity to one another,” she said.

“It’s likely we’re going to continue to see measures such as self-monitoring for symptoms of sickness and illness ... in some of our high-volume and customer-focused locations.”

The Village has also eased off on occupancy limits at most locations, with one exception being Municipal Hall, where occupancy is limited to eight members of staff at a time due to a shortage of desk space and some people’s concerns about returning to work before getting their second dose of the vaccine.

“We did also take into account the new requirements from WorkSafeBC with regards to a fully functioning ventilation system,” she said about the air conditioning challenges town hall faced during the heat wave.

“All those challenges have been fixed and we do have air conditioning back, we do just want to take a little bit of extra precaution to ensure that the ventilation systems are fully in line with the WorkSafeBC requirements.”

An additional concern, posed by Councillor Ted Craddock, was the timeline for allowing the public to sit in on meetings again.

Nikki Gilmore, the VOP’s chief administrative officer, said that may still not be on the horizon for at least another month, when Step 4 of the B.C. Restart Plan is rolled out.

A VOP survey was also done following the launch of the B.C. Restart Plan to assess how comfortable people were working from home.

It found that just over 90 per cent of people polled believed that they could complete more than half of their role from home, while more than 80 per cent of respondents thought they were at least just as productive, if not more productive, when working from home.

One solution for Municipal Hall, discussed at the council meeting and one that could be applied to other businesses as well, was shifting to a hybrid approach of returning to workplaces while allowing for more flexibility for workers to continue to work from home occasionally.

“I’m anxious to see where we go … The hybrid model seems to be the one that is quite popular at this point, although some are going for full-remote work,” said Pemberton Mayor Mike Richman.

“I think we are missing certain dynamics that are important to a strong team—the ability to connect with those managers, as well as coworkers, the social aspect of it.

“But also seeing the results of the survey, and people obviously do appreciate the ability and the flexibility to work at home, I’m hoping that a hybrid model will accommodate all of that and bring back some of the important dynamics that we are missing in the office.”