Category: Workforce Trends

Reopening Restaurants

New York Phase 3: Reopening Restaurants

Phase 3 of New York’s reopening plan allows restaurants and food service businesses to expand or resume operations. Reopening restaurants encompasses most food service establishments, including food trucks and concessions.

In Phase 1, food service businesses could reopen for takeout and delivery only. In Phase 2, restaurants could host diners in open outdoor seating, with restrictions. Once in Phase 3, they may resume indoor customer seating under State guidelines.

The industry-specific guidelines have been divided into five categories: Physical Distancing; Protective Equipment; Hygiene, Cleaning, and Disinfection; Communication; and Screening. Summary Guidelines for food services include both Mandatory and Recommended Best Practices. The restaurant guidelines also indicate that businesses must follow other CDC and Department of Health recommendations to help protect workers and customers and prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Interim Guidance for Outdoor and Take-Out/Deliver Food Services During the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency

Interim Guidance for Food Services During the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency

Physical Distancing

All food service establishments are subject to a 50% indoor occupancy limit in Phase 3. This restriction applies to both personnel and customers. To achieve this, employers should consider reducing on-site headcount, adjusting work hours and shifts, prioritizing tasks to focus on those that allow for social distancing, and posting signs that provide clear directions to staff.

Outdoor seating capacity is restricted to the number of tables and seats that can be safely arranged with proper social distancing. Indoor and outdoor tables must be placed at least 6 feet apart. When this is not practical, businesses can install physical barriers between tables that are a minimum of 5 feet in height.

Employees must wear acceptable face coverings at all times. Patrons must wear face coverings unless they are sitting at their table. Everyone at the table must be part of the same party, up to a maximum of 10 people. Customers can sit at a bar or communal tables only if they can maintain 6 feet between them.

Restaurants must post 6-foot social distancing markers to remind workers and customers to keep space between them. These markings are especially crucial in commonly used areas such as cash registers, places where employees clock in and out for their shift, where health screenings will occur, break rooms, restrooms, and take-out windows. Restaurants should mark exits and entries to avoid confusion, ideally reducing bi-directional foot traffic.

Additional Physical Distancing Suggestions

Servers should have specific work areas to avoid unnecessary crossover. Kitchen staff assigned to prepare food, cook during the shift, or clean should be designated to one area for the entire shift. Management should train these employees on ways to reduce physical contact with food, shared surfaces, or other coworkers. If asocial distancing is not practical, restaurants can use physical barriers where it would not negatively affect airflow or block emergency and fire exits.

As in earlier phases, reopening restaurants should continue to enable customers to place takeout orders online or by phone only. Customers should remain in their cars until the food is ready for pick-up and take advantage of contactless orders, delivery, payment, and pick-up procedures.

Protective Equipment

Except when seated at their table, all customers must wear face coverings unless they are under two years old or have a medical condition that restricts their ability to wear them. This requirement applies, for example, for trips to the bar, restroom, outside, or to pay.

Employees must wear face coverings whenever they come within 6 feet of a coworker or customer. Employers must provide face coverings to all employees at no cost and clean or replace them when necessary. However, employees may wear their own face coverings. Employers also must train employees on how to use face coverings properly while at work.

Food service businesses should reduce the sharing of objects or equipment. Where that is not possible, they must supply employees with disposable gloves to prevent the transmission of the coronavirus. Staff should wear disposable gloves when handling food and replace them before switching to a new task. Workers must practice proper hand hygiene when disposable gloves are not being used.

Additional Protective Equipment Suggestions

Operators of food trucks and concessions without running water must require staff to wear disposable gloves, use hand sanitizer, and follow proper federal, state, and local food handling and hygiene requirements.

Hygiene, Cleaning, and Disinfection

Businesses offering food services must adhere to hygiene and sanitation requirements set forth by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Department of Health (DOH). These requirements cover areas of the kitchen where employees may handle food preparation and serve customers, high-touch surfaces and equipment, and indoor and outdoor seating areas.

Restaurants must arrange for frequent cleaning at least after every shift, daily, or more frequently. They should pay particular attention to shared objects and surfaces and high-traffic areas. This cleaning and disinfecting should be performed using the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) products recommended for COVID-19. Restaurants must maintain a log that documents the date, time, and scope of cleaning and disinfection.

Restaurants must perform a deep cleaning and sanitation as frequently as possible. They may need to engage the services of a third party specializing in cleaning and disinfecting buildings.

Where possible, restaurants should increase the circulation of outdoor air while maintaining safety precautions–hence, the preference for outdoor seating.

Staff must be provided with hand hygiene stations that include soap, running warm water, and disposable paper towels, as well as an alcohol-based hand sanitizer containing 60% or more alcohol for situations where handwashing is not feasible. Signs near hand sanitizer stations should direct employees to wash visibly soiled hands with soap and water. Restaurants also need to ensure that receptacles for proper disposal of soiled items, including face masks and disposable gloves, are available.

Additional Cleaning Suggestions

Owners of food service establishments should consider switching to disposable menus. Reopening restaurants should also try to reduce the distribution of electronics to customers. These include buzzers used to notify customers that their table is ready and tablets used for digital menus or entertainment during the visit. Hand sanitizer should be readily available to customers, especially in high-touch areas.

Establishments offering take-out and delivery must implement the following:

  • Provide hand hygiene stations for takeout customers.
  • Require all staff to practice proper hand hygiene and use disposable gloves when necessary.
  • Increase ventilation of indoor takeout areas through windows or some other means.
  • Use single-use condiments and sauces whenever feasible. If not, staff must clean condiment bottles and containers after each use.

Communication

Once a reopening restaurant has read and digested the guidelines, it must determine how to implement them. Each business must develop a COVID-19 safety plan. The State has created a safety plan template to use as a starting point. However, each company should have a plan that is consistent with its business and facilities.

Employers may include additional policies and procedures in their safety plan that will assist with slowing down or eliminating the virus’s transition. Once that is complete, the company must submit an affirmation confirming that they have read, understood, and intend to implement the guidelines.

All employees should be trained on the new protocols and educated on the importance of cleaning and sanitation, as well as the need to respect social distancing guidelines and wear face coverings, when appropriate.

Restaurants must have signs inside and outside of the building to remind staff and visitors of the importance:

  • Covering their nose and mouth with a face covering.
  • How to properly store and, when necessary, discard PPE.
  • Adhering to physical distancing instructions.
  • The need to report symptoms of or exposure to COVID-19, and how they should do so.
  • The need to follow hand hygiene and cleaning and disinfection guidelines.
  • Following appropriate respiratory hygiene and cough etiquette.

Many of the recommended signs can be found on the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention website, located here.

Screening & Tracking

A mandatory health screening assessment must be performed on all employees and vendors that visit the worksite. The screening should include questions about symptoms and an individual’s contact with COVID-19 patients. It can also include temperature checking, testing, and the collection of contact information. The guidelines encourage employers to screen staff before they report to work, if possible.

For situations involving positive cases or potential exposure, business operators must follow the DOH’s “Interim Guidance for Public and Private Employees Returning to Work Following COVID-19 Infection or Exposure”. The guidance, which is likely to change, includes instructions on how to properly clean and disinfect work areas after learning of a positive case and when employees may return to work after exposure.

Upon reopening, employers must keep a daily continuous log of all employees and vendors that enter the restaurant. The log should consist of contact information for anyone who had close contact with workers, unless they wore appropriate PPE. Businesses should attempt to collect contact information for customers, but they cannot mandate customers to provide it. Contact information will help facilitate proper contact tracing when necessary.

Food service establishments will be required to notify state and local health departments if a worker tests positive for COVID-19 or has had contact with an infected individual. In the event of a positive case, employers must cooperate with contact tracing efforts while maintaining confidentiality.

What Should New York Restaurants Do Next?

Restaurants and other food service establishments open in Phase 3 must review the industry-specific guidelines and affirm that they have read, understood, and intend to implement them before reopening. You must draft and post a safety plan and post appropriate signage. You also need a strategy to perform health screenings and assist in contact tracing when required.

Each food service business must designate a safety monitor responsible for ensuring the company’s compliance with the safety plan and reopening guidelines. Employers have to train individuals responsible for conducting the health screening, collecting contact information, performing contact tracing, and notifying the state and local health department of positive tests.

All reopening restaurants must also develop a plan for cleaning, disinfecting, and performing contact tracing if a positive case occurs. Minimum measures should include cleaning and disinfecting all heavy-transit areas and high-touch surfaces.

 

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Reopening Offices

New York Phase 2: Reopening Offices

Phase 2 of New York’s reopening plan includes separate guidelines for offices and commercial building management. Where different entities own and operate portions of a commercial building, multiple parties have obligations related to keeping people safe within the building.

The industry-specific guidelines have been divided into five categories: Physical Distancing; Protective Equipment; Hygiene and Cleaning; Communication; and Screening. Summary Guidelines for these industry groups include both Mandatory and Recommended Best Practices. The office and commercial building management guidelines also indicate that businesses must follow other CDC and Department of Health recommendations that will assist in protecting employees and customers and prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Office-Based Work

Companies whose core functions are performed in an office environment may reopen in Phase 2. But to do so, they must implement the mandatory requirements outlined in the NYS guidelines. These include businesses previously operating as essential businesses that fall into the office-based work category.

Office-based work typically includes these categories, as well as an office location that performs similar functions for a company even if it falls into another industry category:

  • Professional Services
  • Non-Profit
  • Technology
  • Administrative Support
  • Higher Education Administration (excluding full campus reopening)

NYS Summary Guidelines

NYS Detailed Guidelines

Commercial Building Management 

This category covers all commercial and non-residential buildings in regions that have been permitted to reopen offices, including those that were previously operating as essential businesses. Since most commercial buildings have other industries operating within them, the guidelines for this business sector add to the requirements placed on a physical location overall. Thus, where one party owns the building and another or multiple others operate within it, several businesses may need to work together to satisfy the combined requirements for reopening offices.

NYS Summary Guidelines

NYS Detailed Guidelines

Physical Distancing Requirements

The mandatory health and safety guidelines address the physical distancing requirements for commercial building management and locations performing office-based work. Offices are restricted to no more than 50% of the maximum occupancy for the location, as set forth by the certificate of occupancy.

Individuals must stay at least 6 feet from each other at all times unless the core activity requires a shorter distance. If people must come within 6 feet of each other, they must wear proper face coverings.

Social distancing markers must be posted in all commonly used and other areas within the office where individuals may gather (e.g., health screening stations, clock-in/clock-out stations, or restrooms located within the office). Commercial Building Managers will be responsible for posting social distancing markers in any common areas throughout the building (e.g., restroom, elevator, lobby, health screening stations).

The use of confined spaces should be restricted to only one person at a time, unless all individuals are wearing proper face coverings. Even when utilizing suitable face coverings, no more than 50% of maximum occupancy will be permitted (e.g., elevators, restrooms). All non-essential common areas in the building and individual offices should be closed.

In-person gatherings must be limited to the extent possible. The guidelines encourage the use of tele- or videoconferencing. Shared workspaces should be eliminated or reduced to the extent possible. At a minimum, shared workspaces must be cleaned and disinfected between each use.

Employers in office-based environments should take advantage of alternate means to reduce interpersonal contact and congregations. Possibilities include adjusting workplace hours, only requiring essential staff to report to the office, modifications to employee shifts and office design, or changes to arrival and departure times.

Additional Physical Distance Requirements

Commercial building managers have some additional responsibilities. They must educate tenants on maximum occupancy limits for all rented or leased space and monitor compliance with the restrictions. They must inform tenants of social distancing requirements and of the need for wearing proper face coverings whenever a 6-foot distance from other individuals is not feasible. Depending on the terms of the lease agreement, building managers might be responsible for making physical altercations to the office space to allow for compliance with these requirements.

Protective Equipment Guidelines

Commercial building managers and employers overseeing locations with office-based work must provide employees with acceptable face coverings. They must provide masks at no cost to the employee and ensure that there is an adequate supply. They must educate employees on how to correctly put on, take off, and discard the face coverings.

Workers should avoid the sharing of objects, equipment, or workspaces whenever possible. These include items such as tools, laptops, touchscreens, printers, and writing utensils. Employers can either require workers that share objects and equipment to wear disposable gloves, provided at no cost by the employer, or clean and disinfect shared equipment between each use and provide employees with proper hand hygiene stations.

Additional Physical Equipment Guidelines

Commercial building managers will likely need to install physical barriers in any location where employees interact with the public, such as reception and security desks. OSHA recommends this measure.

Hygiene and Cleaning Guidelines

Commercial building managers and companies performing office-based work must adhere to the hygiene and sanitation requirements set forth by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Department of Health (DOH). These protocols include providing and maintaining proper hand hygiene stations throughout the building. Hand hygiene stations include soap, running water, and disposable paper towels, as well as an alcohol-based hand sanitizer containing 60% or more alcohol for areas where handwashing is not feasible.

Offices must be adequately cleaned and disinfected using registered disinfectants, at least as often as employees and contractors change work stations. Commonly used or high-risk areas should be cleaned and disinfected even more frequently. Employers are responsible for conducting rigorous cleaning and disinfection at least after each shift, daily or more often.

Companies must establish procedures to follow for confirmed COVID-19 cases. These should cover the cleaning and disinfecting of the individual’s worksite and the surrounding area, all heavy transit areas, and high-touch areas (e.g., such as elevators, lobbies, building entrances, badge screeners, restroom handrails, and door handles).

Commercial building managers and tenants should refer to the terms of their lease for guidance on which party is responsible for complying with these requirements for reopening offices.

Communication Guidelines

Once the company has had an opportunity to read and digest the guidelines, it must determine to implement them in the workplace. They must develop a safety plan. New York State has created a safety plan template to use as a starting point. However, each business should have a plan that is consistent with their business and facilities.

Employers may include additional policies and procedures that will assist with slowing down or eliminating the transition of the virus. Once that is complete, the company must submit an affirmation confirming that they have read, understood, and intend to implement the guidelines.

Companies must train employees on the new protocols and educate them on the importance of cleaning and sanitation, as well as the need to respect social distancing guidelines and wear face coverings when appropriate.

Offices must have signs inside and outside of the building to remind staff and visitors of the importance of proper hygiene, social distancing, appropriate use of PPE, and the mandatory cleaning and disinfecting protocols.

Many of the recommended signs can be found on the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention website, located here. It contains printable posters for businesses to utilize related to the following:

    • How to protect yourself and others in public settings;
    • The importance of wearing face coverings;
    • How to safely wear cloth face coverings;
    • Symptoms of COVID-19 that individuals should look out for;
    • How to stop the spread of germs;
    • Facts about COVID-19; and
    • Hand washing.

Screening & Tracking

Businesses reopening offices must implement mandatory health screening assessments for all employees and visitors. This screening should include questions about symptoms and an individual’s contact with COVID-19 patients. It can also include temperature checking, testing, and the collection of contact information. Remote screening before a person comes on-premises is ideal, if possible.

Those businesses located in a shared commercial building should coordinate with the building manager to help facilitate those screenings upon reopening offices. Some building managers could decide to organize mandatory health screenings for any individual that enters their building each day. By screening employees and visitors when they first enter the building, it would reduce potential exposure of an individual that was symptomatic or COVID-19 positive from interacting with others in the building’s common areas.

Employees who have COVID-19 symptoms and either tested positive for the virus or did not receive a test must remain home for a minimum of 14 days. An employee who does not have symptoms, but tested positive for the virus must self-quarantine for 14 days. If an employee had close contact with a person with COVID-19 for a prolonged period of time and is symptomatic, they must remain in quarantine for 14 days. An employee who had contact with an individual with COVID-19, but is not symptomatic, should also stay in self-quarantine for 14 days.

Upon reopening, employers must keep a daily continuous log of all employees and visitors that enter the worksite. The log should consist of contact information for anyone who had close contact with workers without using appropriate PPE. Businesses should attempt to collect contact information for customers, but they cannot mandate customers to provide it. Contact information will help facilitate proper contact tracing when necessary.

Next Steps for Reopening Offices

If you fall into one of these Phase 2 categories, you must review the industry-specific guidelines and affirm that you have read, understood, and intend to implement them before reopening. You must draft and post a safety plan and post appropriate signage. You also need a strategy to perform health screenings and assist in contact tracing when required.

Employers in shared commercial buildings should coordinate with building management. Individual companies may not have sufficient control over the premises to meet all State guidelines alone. Regardless, each business must designate a safety monitor that is responsible for ensuring compliance with the company’s safety plan. Employers must train individuals who will be responsible for conducting the health screening, collecting contact information, performing contact tracing, and notifying the state and local health department of positive tests.

Each company reopening offices must also develop a plan for cleaning, disinfecting, and performing contact tracing if a positive case occurs. Minimum measures should include cleaning and disinfecting all heavy-transit areas and high-touch surfaces.

 

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Reopening New York - Phase 2

Reopening New York – Phase 2

The federal government put the individual states in charge of reopening after coronavirus shutdowns. In New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo divided New York into 10 regions and assigned a Control Room to oversee the reopening efforts in each Region. Some of those regions entered Phase 2 of the reopening plan on May 26, 2020. The State issued industry-specific guidelines for the businesses that can open or expand operations in this next phase.

Click here for more information about Phase 1 of New York’s reopening plan.

Phase 2 Industries

Phase 2 includes these businesses:

However, the following industries will remain closed in Phase 2:

  • Malls; specifically, any indoor common portions of retail shopping malls with 100,000 or more square feet of retail space available for lease; however, any stores located within shopping malls, which have their own external entrances open to the public, separate from the general mall entrance (e.g., strip malls), may open
  • Dine-in and on-premise restaurant or bar service, excluding take-out or delivery for off-premise consumption
  • Large gatherings/event venues, which include establishments that host concerts, conferences, or other in-person performances or presentations in front of an in-person audience
  • Gyms, fitness centers, and exercise classes, except for remote or streaming services
  • Video lottery and casino gaming facilities
  • Movie theaters, except drive-ins
  • Places of public amusement, whether indoors or outdoors, including but not limited to, locations with amusement rides, carnivals, amusement parks, water parks, aquariums, zoos, arcades, fairs, children’s play centers, funplexes, theme parks, bowling alleys, family and children’s attractions

Phase 2 Reopening Guidelines

New York released industry-specific guidance for Phase 2 of the reopening plan on the State’s NY Forward website. The site includes “Summary Guidelines” and “Detailed Guidelines” for each covered industry segment. The documents contain information on how businesses should reopen. Specifically, how to operate in a manner that will minimize the transmission of COVID-19 and adequately protect employees, customers, and vendors from potential exposure. The guidance incorporates CDC and OSHA guidance. The NYS guidelines also set minimum requirements that businesses must implement before reopening. Companies are free to adopt additional health and safety measures to protect people in their offices, stores, and other places of business.

Mandatory Safety Plans

New York has provided a template safety plan that companies can use as a starting point. Upon completion, each business must post its COVID-19 safety plan “conspicuously” in the workplace. Companies don’t have to submit their individual safety plans to any governmental agency, but must make them available if an authorized agency conducts an inspection.

Review of Industry-Specific Guidelines and Affirmation of Receipt

Any business that intends to reopen under Phase 2, or that remained open as an essential business but fits into a Phase 2 industry category, must affirm that it has read and understood the guidelines and will implement them.

Common Phase II Health and Safety Requirements

Although the industry guidelines vary, most contain similar basic requirements. For example, businesses must:

  • Provide all workers with an acceptable face covering at no cost to the employees.
  • Adhere to hygiene, cleaning, and disinfecting requirements from the CDC and Department of Health.
  • Maintain cleaning logs on site that document the date, time, and scope of cleaning.
  • Limit occupancy to 50% of building capacity, including employees, customers, and vendors.
  • Provide and maintain hand hygiene stations in the office, including handwashing with soap, running warm water, and disposable paper towels, as well as an alcohol-based hand sanitizer containing 60% or more alcohol for areas where handwashing is not feasible.
  • Limit occupancy of tightly confined spaces, like elevators, stock rooms, or behind cash registers, to only one person at a time, unless all individuals are wearing face coverings.
  • Post social distancing markers using tape or signs that denote 6 ft. of spacing in commonly used and other applicable areas.
  • Limit the sharing of objects and discourage touching of shared surfaces.
  • Place hand sanitizer throughout the office in convenient locations for use by employees and customers.
  • Post signage to remind personnel and customers to adhere to proper hygiene, social distancing, appropriate PPE, and cleaning and disinfecting protocols.
  • Maintain a continuous log of workers and visitors who have close contact with other individuals at the worksite or area.
  • Implement mandatory health screening and assessment (e.g., questionnaire, temperature check) for employees, contractors, and other visitors, asking about (1) COVID-19 symptoms in past 14 days, (2) positive COVID-19 test in past 14 days, and (3) close contact with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases in the past 14 days. Responses must be reviewed and documented daily.
  • Have a plan for cleaning, disinfecting, and contact tracing in the event of a positive case.

Top Priorities for Phase 2 Businesses

If your business falls into a Phase 2 industry, you must review the relevant guidance documents. They are available at https://forward.ny.gov/industries-reopening-phase.

Remember, your company must submit the compliance affirmation and prepare and post a written safety plan. To do so, you must evaluate the realities of your operations and modify them accordingly. As the State documents emphasize, these are only the legally-mandated minimum requirements. Government officials may shut you down or take other action if you are not complying. However, satisfying the State’s guidelines does not guarantee that the coronavirus cannot be spread in your facilities. Moreover, it likely will not provide an absolute defense to possible claims by employees or other individuals that your business is unsafe or that the company is responsible for them contracting COVID-19.

The State’s guidelines are not close to normal operations for most businesses. And your company must continue to monitor the latest developments and adapt accordingly. There is currently no timetable for how long these extensive restrictions will remain in place. For example, the start of Phase 2 has not lifted the restrictions on Phase 1 businesses.

 

Horton Law continues to monitor the evolving requirements for all New York businesses. Sign up for our email newsletter to receive our latest blog posts and announcements of upcoming free webinars on this topic. You can also follow us on LinkedIn for even more frequent updates.