To Our Valued Customers,
As the second wave continues to evolve across Canada, we have continually adapted our COVID-19 response to reflect learnings and best practices in the construction industry. Northstar Access is committed to operating in a way that limits the spread of COVID-19 across our communities, including to your locations, your employees, and your families. We take this responsibility VERY seriously. In addition to updating our internal policies to adapt to evolving government and customer requirements, we have proactively taken the following measures:
Sick Leave: We have extended paid sick leave to all employees. Salaried and Hourly. Union and Non-union. We continually remind our employees to “Stay home if you are sick”. And the best way to ensure that our employees can take this approach is to pay them to stay home if they are feeling unwell, or if they have potentially been exposed to COVID-19. We encourage other employers throughout Canada to take this basic and necessary approach.
Masks & 2-metre distance: Our employees (scaffolders, estimators, office, and yard employees) are required to wear masks at all times, unless they can maintain a 2-metre distance. This is our policy, both indoors or outdoors. No exceptions.
Daily Screening: Our scaffolders complete a COVID-19 screener every morning before starting their day.
Work Pods and Crew Scheduling: We schedule our crews to minimize the intermixing of personnel throughout the week. i.e., Our crews stay together whenever possible in order to maintain a consistent “bubble”. This policy has been extremely effective at containing the potential spread of COVID-19 across our employee base, or between customer worksites. These small steps make a huge difference.
Hygiene: We promote hand washing, and other basic but effective hygiene policies throughout our workplace.
Right to Refuse Work: Our staff are reminded to refuse work if they feel their safety is at risk, due to COVID-19 or other safety concerns. We provide multiple channels for our employees to raise concerns.
Paul Zvonar President & CEO