Hand sanitizer everywhere. Work at home. How Idaho life after coronavirus will change
Gov. Brad Little’s stay-at-home order is set to expire on Thursday, April 30. But for Idaho businesses and government agencies, returning to normalcy won’t be like flipping on a light switch. In some cases, what was normal two months ago may never be normal again.
With Idahoans increasingly eager to reopen the economy, businesses are taking a cautious approach, not wanting to expose workers and customers to the coronavirus. The return to normalcy could be slow and riddled with false starts as the curve of sick and dying people fluctuates.
Shoppers can expect the social distancing restrictions of recent weeks to stay and perhaps evolve. Nail and hair salons may take clients by appointment only.
Major business conferences like Boise Startup Week could be scaled down and moved online. Colleges may have fewer students in classrooms.
Some Idahoans heading back to work may first be asked to take a test to check for immunity to COVID-19. Hand sanitizer and face masks may be distributed around the workplace.
And many workers, having been ordered to work at home for social distancing, are likely to keep working there long after the virus crisis has passed.
In phone interviews with the Idaho Statesman, business executives said they are waiting for guidelines from the governor’s office to determine how to move forward. Facing so much uncertainty, some haven’t yet bothering to put together full plans for reopening.
“It’s a lot of unknowns,” said Jeff Heath, CEO of Boise-based Business Interiors of Idaho, which helps businesses furnish their workplace.
“We can’t come up with a detailed plan from now to the end of the year,” said Tiam Rastegar, executive director of Trailhead Boise, a startup incubator and coworking space downtown. “We have to be light on our feet.”
Some businesses already have taken advantage of Little’s April 15 amended order allowing “nonessential” businesses to reopen if they can conduct business using curbside pickup and delivery, without customers entering physical premises.
Little has already said that some businesses “where people simply cannot safely social distance” should not expect to reopen May 1. These includes nightclubs, bars and restaurants for dine-in; indoor gyms and recreational facilities; and hair and nail salons. But all of them will reopen eventually.
Convention and entertainment centers also will stay closed after April 30, public events and gatherings will remain off-limits, the governor said April 15.
Shopping appointments: Here to stay?
Client-facing businesses are adjusting their business models so they can reopen, even at a reduced scale.
In March, the North End Organic Nursery off Chinden Boulevard started asking customers to book 30-minute shopping appointments, so as not to have more than 10 customers in store at a time. They plan to continue that through May.
“As we go into the busiest month of the year for us, the month of May, the last thing we need are throngs of people in the store,” said owner Lindsay Schramm. She said the nursery may take a financial hit, since it won’t be able to serve as many customers.
After the governor’s stay-at-home order, Sallie Riley, the owner of Hollywood Market Yoga, moved fast to set up online classes for members. So far, the classes have attracted an average of nearly 30 sign-ups, about the same number of people who typically gathered for in-person classes at the studio’s compact location in the North End.
When she is allowed to reopen, Riley plans to limit her in-person classes to 10 people at first, to ensure a distance of 6 feet between members. She’s also encouraging members to change at home, rather than in the studio’s dressing rooms.
“We just have such a small space,” she said. “I want to open, but I want to make sure we have a system in place.. I don’t want to open up too early.”
Salons, spas look to lure back customers
The beauty industry in particular is trying to find ways to open as soon as possible.
Once he can bring customers back in, Quoc Ngo, manager of La Vie Salon off of Overland and Cloverdale roads, said he’ll ask all customers to wash their hands before getting a manicure and require his staff to wear masks. Pedicure clients will be seated every other chair to ensure they are at least 6 feet apart.
“Will that stop the virus? We don’t know — but we are trying our best to deal with customer safety,” Ngo said.
At Hannah Nails and Spa next to the downtown Boise WinCo, owner Hang Nguyen just ordered dividers placed between each manicure desk. She plans to take clients by appointment only — as she did before the pandemic closed her business — but will lock her door to the public.
“I can’t allow a group of walk-ins to come in, because we need to keep it private,” Nguyen said. “With too many people coming in, other clients could get scared.”
After having to cancel all its appointments in April, Mountain View Pointe Dental in Meridian is planning to keep its May teeth cleanings on the books. Already, the dentist’s office was tightly booked, said office manager Carla Matosich, but the staff expects to see more emergency cases from people who had to put off care during the stay-at-home order.
College campuses
The coronavirus upended the spring semester at Idaho universities, forcing them to cancel their graduation ceremonies and move classes online. Now administrators are wondering whether the fall semester could be disrupted, too.
Some faculty miss teaching students in classrooms, which many academics consider an essential part of higher education. But already, Boise State University has decided to move its summer classes online.
“As for fall, there are just too many variables to even start to hazard a guess as to how a reopening may look,” wrote Greg Hahn, Boise State spokesman in an email to the Statesman. “We are chasing down as many ideas and opportunities as we can, but as we wait for public health experts to give us guidance as the situation evolves, everything is pure speculation right now.”
At Northwest Nazarene University, administrators are on the same page.
“We don’t know what the CDC guidelines will recommend,” said Mark Cork, associate vice president for marketing and communications. “We don’t know what the governor will release.”
NNU’s Nampa campus was quiet this last week, at a time when it would usually be bustling with prospective students touring the classrooms and socializing with upperclassmen as part of the school’s admitted-student days.
But this year, the school went virtual, packaging the warmth of the campus community into digital panel discussions and prerecorded tours of dormitories.
The virtual tours went well, Cork said, with higher attendance than past years — but he hopes to get students back on campus in the fall.
“We are planning for and hoping for a normal face to face schedule then,” he said.
Airport an almost-no-fly zone
At the Boise Airport, travel isn’t expected to pick back up for months. The airport closed all of its restaurants in March, with the exception of Einstein’s Bagels, which is offering a few grab-and-go options.
Reopening those restaurants will depend on passenger traffic, said Sean Briggs, communication manager for the airport. Early numbers aren’t promising. In March, passenger travel was down 49% from 2019. Traffic is expected to be even lower for April.
Workplaces adapt
For many employers, the primary question is how to bring their employees back, without bringing in the disease.
Everyday spaces shared by workers — like conference rooms, elevators and drinking fountains — are now viewed by employers as possible sources of contamination.
That particularly worries Jeff Heath, the Business Interiors of Idaho CEO, who manages the coworking space Wheelhouse in the same building at 176 S. Capitol Blvd. Workers using Wheelhouse’s shared spaces will be expected to wipe down shared areas after using them.
Heath also reached out to Crush the Curve Idaho to discuss getting employees tested before coming to the office. It’s a tactic that larger firms like General Motors Co. are exploring in an effort to make employees feel more confident about returning to the workplace.
Not everyone will return to the office at once. When they do, he’ll make sure people will be spaced apart from one another.
Temperature checks and health screenings will remain in place at Micron’s offices in Boise as they were at the start of the outbreak, according to spokeswoman Mayra Tostado.
Business travel is still on pause. Any Micron employees diagnosed with COVID-19 will be required to self-quarantine for 14 days, and once cleared by a doctor, will need to wait another week before they can return to any Micron office.
At Zions Bank, executives are in early talks about whether to bring back employees in phases, said Western Idaho Region President Toni Nielsen.
In March, the bank also implemented an emergency leave policy that allowed employees to take off time to take care of children or relatives without using up sick days. The company is discussing whether to extend the policy further.
Some employers who rapidly directed staff members to work from home in March may seek to make the arrangement permanent.
Even some local governments — often seen as behind the curve when it comes to workplace culture and technology — may allow more staff to work from home.
Ada County Commissioner Kendra Kenyon said the last five weeks may help the county transition away from the “old paradigm” of an 9-to-5 office job, instead allowing managers to carry out more flexible schedules.
In Boise, Mayor Lauren McLean hasn’t yet decided when she’ll bring employees back to City Hall.
“We’ve all learned through this that there are great benefits to working from home,” she said in a video call. “I imagine that especially in the foreseeable future, we will be continuing to have employees work from home, and my guess is that many companies and other employers are thinking about the same.”
Garden City Mayor John Evans agrees.
“We’re finding out there are things we can do from home, in some instances perhaps more efficiently with higher productivity,” he said.
Other local governments may not follow suit. A spokeswoman for the city of Eagle said that they don’t anticipate work-from-home becoming permanent. And while the Ada County Highway District discussed allowing more flexible work alternatives, it ultimately decided against them.
Rapid technology adoption helps public engagement
The stay-at-home order forced some local governments to overhaul their online systems to allow for more remote public interaction. Those temporary changes could have long-term benefits.
In Ada County, most trials are being conducted online. The county also transitioned some services online to prevent people from having to come into the courthouse. These changes could streamline some business processes and reduce the need for as much physical space.
“Our ability to to business virtually (can) save taxpayers money when it comes to building more bricks and mortar,” Kenyon said.
Another benefit? You might never have to wait hours sitting on an unforgiving plastic chair for your chance to speak at a public hearing. Eagle, Canyon County and Boise all put in place systems to allow for remote public comment.
That was a tool that had been suggested to McLean before the coronavirus crisis by a team looking at ways to improve public engagement with the city. Three months ago, she thought, “How are we going to do that?”
“And instead, we know that now we can do it,” she said.
‘No substitute’ for human interaction
Most businesses and governments are eager to get their employees back in the same space.
While Trailhead has been running many of its workshops for startup founders over video-conferencing, Rastegar, the executive director, said the incubator experience relies upon shared space. The same goes for Boise Startup Week, a fall conference that brings together tech entrepreneurs across the west to downtown Boise.
“These rely on people bringing their energy into a room, energy turning into ideas, ideas bouncing off one another,” he said. Rastegar said Boise Startup Week’s organizers will meet in June to decide if the conference should be moved online.
As in tech, human interactions are critical to relationship-building in the banking industry, Zions Bank’s Nielsen said.
“There’s no substitute for having people be together,” she said.
Reporters John Sowell and Hayley Harding contributed.
