"New England Aquarium cuts staff jobs, hours in wake of coronavirus shutdown; The moves affect 200-plus workers in an effort to pare back expenses" by Janelle Nanos and Tim Logan Globe Staff, April 3, 2020
On Friday, the New England Aquarium announced it is significantly cutting back its workforce and employee hours as a way to stave off losses incurred while the institution is shuttered during the COVID-19 pandemic. The moves, which will affect over 200 full-time, part-time, and temporary staff and involve pay cuts for some who remain, are among the first to take place at the city’s major cultural institutions.
The whip$aw will not only destroy those being let go, the survivors will also suffer ramifications of these Trauma-based Mind Control Psychological Operations that are gutting livelihoods and businesses.
In an interview with the Globe, aquarium president Vikki Spruill said it was devastating to have to make the call to pare back staffing at the institution. “These are absolutely impossible decisions and it’s just heartbreaking,” she said. “This is a life commitment for people; it’s really more than a job. It’s made these decisions harder than other business decisions I’ve ever had to make.”
It's the price we must all pay for a benevolent and generous world government and enrichment of the Trillionaire cla$$.
To keep the institution solvent, and ensure that the 20,000-plus animals are taken care of, involved a careful calculus: 43 full-time employees will be laid off, 50 will be furloughed, and 34 will have reduced hours, effective immediately. Nearly 80 part-time workers and seasonal workers will be laid off as well.
I'm not saying the animals should slaughtered, but they are being cared for more than fellow human beings. That's what will be left after they have thinned us out.
Those staff remaining who are paid over $75,000 will take a pay cut based on their salary range, of 7.5 percent to 25 percent, said Spruill, whose own salary has been cut by 36 percent. All employees who will be furloughed or laid off will receive two weeks of notice pay and will continue to receive their health care benefits for the next three months.
Again, p$ychologically, your grateful for the ma$$ive pay cut (la$h of whip).
Spruill said this plan will allow the aquarium to continue its operations for three to six months without revenue, while anticipating a slow build-back after restrictions are loosened. The aquarium had a $20 million endowment as of its 2018 public filings. Spruill said the majority of the aquarium’s revenue comes from ticket sales and events, both of which support 80 percent of its monthly $3.5 million operational expenses.
Is that how long they expect this to go on?
All the way into fall and beyond?
Can't say they didn't warn us.
Funny thing is, animals sense danger. Humans don't, until it's too late.
Well, not all humans.
Spruill had intended to spend 2020 celebrating the aquarium’s 50th anniversary. Now, she has been on calls with zoo and aquarium directors throughout the country as they struggle to figure out what the future looks like for their institutions. Earlier this week, the National Aquarium in Baltimore announced it was furloughing about 100 workers and reducing the salaries of those that remained. The San Antonio Zoo has also furloughed half its staff, and the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden said it would lay off all of its 174 part-time and seasonal employees.
Yup, the PARTY IS OVER.... forever.
“We’re unique from other cultural institutions and museums in the city in that even though we’re closed, the animal care continues,” Spruill said, “but I don’t think any of us ever imagined a zero-revenue scenario."
LET 'EM LOOSE LIKE PRISONERS?
Museums and cultural institutions big and small are wrestling with the implications of the sudden disappearance of all visitors, with no return date in site.....
Like, uh, sh!t, the RAPTURE!!?
Time to seal things up.
A harbor seal looked out from an outdoor tank by the front entrance at The New England Aquarium in Boston. Despite cuts to its workforce, staff will continue cleaning and feeding its animals daily during the COVID-19 coronavirus crisis. (David L. Ryan/Globe Staff)
Sitting there, looking out the window. Just like you.
--more--"
Related: Museum of Fine Arts will remain closed, furlough staffers through June 30
Ah, who care$?
When we are all gone, the luxury cla$$ will be able to enjoy the world at their leisure.
"State’s top court OK’s potential release of prisoners being held for trial to ease ‘coronavirus crisis’; Advocates argued that inmates faced heightened disease risk" by Vernal Coleman and Andrea Estes Globe Staff, April 3, 2020
The state’s highest court on Friday ruled that inmates awaiting trial — except those facing violent and other serious charges — may be released to help relieve the “crisis engendered by the COVID-19 epidemic.”
“We agree that the situation is urgent and unprecedented, and that a reduction in the number of people who are held in custody is necessary,” wrote Justice Frank Gaziano, in a 44-page decision, but the court rejected pleas from a coalition of criminal defense lawyers and advocates who had sought the release of many more prisoners — including those who were already convicted. The court said it does not have the authority to change sentences after they have been imposed.
The court, instead, urged the Massachusetts Parole Board to act more quickly to approve the release of inmates nearing the end of their sentences, or who have already been approved for parole but haven’t yet been released.
Whenever authority says something is urgent, hit the brakes!
That's how we "stumble" into wars!
“This [decision] will result in some releases in the counties and very few, if any, in the [state prisons],” said Elizabeth Matos, executive director of Prisoners’ Legal Services. “I have little faith that the Parole Board will feel the least bit influenced by the court’s strong encouragement for them to act to release individuals approved for parole, but they clearly should.”
It's not all gone yet?
The ruling calls for inmates seeking release to file motions, which will be heard within two days. Any pretrial detainee will be presumed eligible for release unless they’re being held without bail, present a flight risk, or post an “unreasonable danger to the community."
Matthew Segal, who argued the case for the defense lawyers, echoed Matos’s reaction.....
It's clear at which of side of the table the Globe is sitting.
--more--"
Correctional officers used alcohol hand sanitizer before entering the main cell block area at the Worcester County House of Corrections in West Boylston. (David L. Ryan/Globe Staff)
One can't help but wonder where is the social distancing.
"Judge frees vulnerable Massachusetts Treatment Center inmate after roommate dies; State officials confirm two coronavirus deaths at Bridgewater prison" by Andrea Estes and Vernal Coleman Globe Staff, April 3, 2020
A superior court judge on Friday ordered the release of an especially vulnerable inmate at the Massachusetts Treatment Center, just after his roommate died of coronavirus at the Bridgewater facility, his lawyer said.
Glenn Christie, 54, on Tuesday had asked the Supreme Judicial Court to set him free on compassionate grounds. Christie is in a wheelchair and suffers from kidney disease, among other serious health problems, and he feared that he was vulnerable to infection by the coronavirus. The state’s highest court then asked a superior court judge to decide the issue.
I hate to say it, but one wonders why he is in prison then. Can he really threaten anybody? He faking?
Though his several previous appeals had been turned down, Suffolk Superior Court Heidi Brieger on Friday found that circumstances have changed and Christie should be freed. She ordered that he be screened for COVID-19 and if he is healthy, that he be quarantined for 14 days at a friend’s house.
Well, that is for damn sure.
“There is a God,” said Christie through his attorney, David Rangoviz, who said his client has already been found to be infection-free. He was expecting to be released Friday, but officials said they didn’t have the necessary paperwork and he’d have to spend at least the weekend confined, his lawyer said.
?
The decision comes amid a significant coronavirus outbreak in the Bridgewater prison; 23 inmates and seven staff have tested positive for COVID-19, much more than any other correctional facility. Late on Thursday, the Department of Correction disclosed that an inmate in his 50s with underlying health conditions had died while hospitalized for the novel coronavirus.
Prison officials confirmed on Friday that a second inmate had died after testing positive for COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus. A statement from the Department of Correction said that the inmate was in his 70s, had underlying health conditions and had been incarcerated at the Massachusetts Treatment Center since 2016. Prison officials said the patient had no symptoms of COVID-19 and suffered a stroke.....
There they go again, jiggering the death statistics.
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It occurred to me while reading that all of these are captive populations. The military, old folks homes, prisons. Are they being forced to participate in simulation and drill? Is that why they are being used?
Related: Man sentenced to 12 years in prison for drug trafficking
They let him go, and shouldn't that be a front-page headline?
Homeless facing ‘a disaster for families’
They “feel totally helpless and under attack” as they wait in line for coffee.
(below fold)
Dozens of vehicles waited in line to pick up food at the drive-up window at a Chic-fil-A on Route 53 in Hanover as a police officer kept order. (John Tlumacki/Globe Staff)
He's there to make sure you are wearing your mask -- even though he is not wearing one!
Jayme Danielle Valdez wore masks as they walked home from the pharmacy in Fort Point. Their 8-year-old golden retriever, Tristan, carried their bag. (Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff)
Good thing, too; otherwise, the Globe would zoom in on you.
They were heading to the CVS:
"From CVS to Walgreens, pharmacy workers seek protection against coronavirus in their stores" by Janelle Nanos Globe Staff, April 3, 2020
Pharmacy workers at retail drugstores throughout the country have been asked to staff one of the front lines in the fight against COVID-19. Now they’re increasingly fearful that operating without proper protection has put them at risk of contracting or spreading the coronavirus.
Some staff are so afraid of being exposed that they’re draping shower curtains over their pharmacy counters and begging for sneeze guards at the checkout line.
Aaaaaaaa-choo!
What?
My simple reaction to that, was it is so far beyond any totalitarian system ever known to man! It outdoes the Nazis, Stalin, Mao, anyone. It leaves me shaking my head.
It's going to be a return to the Dark Ages, with people screeching leper at violators like body snatcher pods. This makes the East Germans look like amateurs.
Employees say they’re dedicated to playing their essential role in the health care system, but need significantly more support and supplies. CDC guidelines instructing people to stock up on their daily medications as part of social distancing measures has meant a surge of patients have been filling prescriptions for the weeks ahead, but the lack of widespread COVID-19 testing means that customers who might have symptoms or are still asymptomatic may be putting store employees — and other customers — at risk.
Even if you are negative and healthy, you might be sick!
It's the same thing with evil. Can you see it?
“Nobody at CVS, Walgreens, or Rite-Aid will speak out for themselves,” said Stephen Meyer, an independent pharmacist who launched a Facebook group to help pharmacy workers navigate the crisis. “Many of these large retail chains are starting to become a hub for sickness instead of a hub for wellness.”
Probably always were.
As the crisis has spread, drugstore workers have been celebrated by their employers as unsung heroes in the pandemic. CVS store employees say that despite these outward measures, they still feel under siege. The company has been sending out daily health guidelines to staff, but had to issue a correction last week after its chief medical officer recommended discredited information about methods of fending off the virus. A store in Wayland had to close temporarily after an employee tested positive for COVID-19, and a petition with over 10,000 signatures has been circulating asking CEO Larry Merlo to provide workers with protective gloves and masks, and to encourage drive-through pharmacy options instead of keeping store floors open to the public.
La$t I knew, he was making a good weekly $alary and was able to quit smoking.
The company has made promises that such in-store protective measures will soon be in place, but some employees fear it will be too little, too late.....
--more--"
Isn't CVS based in Rhode Island and have on-site parking lot testing (you get a T-shirt with the DNA swab)?
"Pandemic stigmatizes fleeing New Yorkers" by Paul Schwartzman Washington Post, April 3, 2020
Terrified by the coronavirus, Liz and Ken Frydman fled their apartment in Manhattan for the relative safety of their country house in Connecticut. Then the heating system failed, and they called the local fuel company.
‘‘ ‘Oh, you guys are from New York,’ ” the manager said. The Frydmans assured him their family was virus-free, but the manager agreed to send someone only after they promised that the furnace could be accessed through a cellar door, without entering the main house.
‘‘My workers are very leery of New Yorkers,’’ he said.
In the fickle calculus of what defines fashionable, New Yorkers have always been a constant, the seen-it-all sophisticates whose idea of normalcy includes riding an impossibly overcrowded subway and inhabiting a ridiculously overpriced apartment, but now America’s largest city is pandemic central, and New Yorkers have become the face of the fearsome infection — virtual pariahs whose potential arrival has spurred anxious demands for roadblocks up and down the East Coast.
President Trump fed the apprehension last weekend with talk of quarantining New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Florida’s governor suggested ID checks on Interstate 95 and at airports. Rhode Island’s governor sent the National Guard house-to-house to identify New Yorkers seeking cover in her state.
‘‘Many people consider New Yorkers lepers,’’ a woman wrote on the Facebook page belonging to Betsy Billard, a financial analyst who cried as she read the post the other day in her apartment on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.
And there it is. They are going to turns us upon each other.
Can cannibalism be far behind?
‘‘It is the ultimate in scapegoating,’’ Billard said by phone on yet another morning when the city’s newly unceasing soundtrack — ambulance sirens — wailed from the streets below. ‘‘I was sad and extremely angry.’’
That was where the print copy cut the journey short, and I'm wondering about those silent sirens.
Three hundred miles north, in the Maine oceanfront town of Old Orchard Beach, Scott Eccleston described himself as a ‘‘Christian man’’ and said, ‘‘I want to be understanding and kind. I try to fight off being afraid,’’ yet Eccleston, 64, a photographer who has lived in Old Orchard for 30 years, cannot help but notice that houses in his neighborhood that are normally empty in spring now have two or three cars in the driveway. He sees out-of-state plates everywhere: in the parking lot at Landry’s Shop ‘n Save, on the road when he takes his five-mile walks. It can only mean one thing: The New Yorkers are coming. ‘‘At any other time, I’d say, ‘Welcome to Maine,’ ” Eccleston said. ‘‘Now I want to say, ‘If you’d turn around right now, I’d be so happy.’ ”
Laying the groundwork for restricted travel, and not just by airplane.
It's the Hunger Games, folks. We get the regionalization but not the independence of secession.
Mike Andrews, the manager of a Maine construction supply center, thinks of himself as a funny guy who likes to post funny memes on Facebook. Searching Google for images of COVID-19 recently, he found one he liked: a cartoon of a man tagged as a New Yorker shaking hands with another man, who is simultaneously sawing off his right arm, presumably to avoid the coronavirus. ‘‘It went ballistically crazy — never had anything go nuts before,’’ Andrews said, delighted that the post had been shared 100 times. Andrews, 41, lives in Camden, a seaside town of 5,000 residents. He insisted that he has nothing against New Yorkers, but he admitted feeling rattled by seeing their cars in the parking lot at the local Hannaford supermarket. ‘‘These people from New York have a lot more chance of having it. So you don’t want to get too close to them,’’ he said before letting out a big cough, which, he quickly explained, was unrelated to the virus.
I hope the reporter was ten yards away!
The threat of being identified as a New Yorker is motivating Kevin Foley, 59, a Manhattan business executive, to leave his car at home when he drives south this weekend to pick up his daughter from a friend’s house. Instead, Foley plans to use his mother-in-law’s car, which has Connecticut plates, ‘‘because he doesn’t want anyone on the Eastern Shore of Maryland running him out of town,’’ said his wife, Donna. ‘‘It would be unthinkable to take the New York car,’’ Foley added. ‘‘It would be like driving around Europe in the ‘60s if you were a German.’’
Or a Russian now.
One getaway that apparently welcomes New Yorkers is Litchfield County, Conn., where real estate broker Graham Klemm said he has rented 20 houses in the past two weeks to Manhattanites paying anywhere from $3,000 to $45,000 a month. ‘‘They were saying, ‘If I wire you money tomorrow, what can I get today?’ ” he said, describing the frantic calls. One couple moved in the same day they signed their lease, driving up from the city in a car filled with belongings. Klemm said there has been no resistance from locals, who are accustomed to New Yorkers visiting year-round and who live in hamlets so small ‘‘you could fit them on cruise ships. Not that anyone would want to go on a cruise ship these days,’’ he added.
I can't $ee my way clear through thi$, sorry, and did they bring any guns with them?
The Frydmans — she is a marketer, he is a crisis communications consultant — bought their home in Sharon, Conn., 11 years ago, mainly using it on weekends. They have New York friends who also own second homes in the area. Everyone had been planning to get together Wednesday for a tailgate cocktail party at a town parking lot.
‘‘We all miss each other,’’ Liz Frydman said. ‘‘All of our cars are going to be six feet apart,’’ but on Wednesday there were news reports that a scientist had warned that 27 feet — not six feet — was the minimal distance needed for safe interactions.
The party was canceled.
They cancelled the party because of what some quack said, and what did you think I meant when I said the party was over forever?
--more--"
You might want to stay out of there if you are from Massachusetts, too.
Maybe it is time to head to Wisconsin after all.
Now get away form me!
"Six-foot rule to protect against coronavirus may not be enough, MIT professor says; Calls research it’s based on outdated, finds that droplets can travel much farther" by Gal Tziperman Lotan Globe Staff, March 31, 2020
The oft-repeated guideline to stay six feet away from other people in order to reduce the risk of coronavirus transmission is based on decades-old research that has sorely needed updating for years, according to an MIT professor who studies the issue.
Avoiding people who have the virus — or might have the virus — is indeed an important and effective way to lower the risk of transmission, but six feet could be much too close if the person is sneezing or coughing, said Lydia Bourouiba, an associate professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who studies the fluid dynamics of disease transmission.
I wonder if she knows Gideon Lichfield, and they will post a guard to enforce that.
“Although such social distancing strategies are critical in the current time of pandemic, it may seem surprising that the current understanding of the routes of host-to-host transmission in respiratory infectious diseases are predicated on a model of disease transmission developed in the 1930s that, by modern standards, seems overly simplified,” Bourouiba wrote in a piece published in the Journal of the American Medical Association last week.
The same as their alleged death tolls in the simulation.
In certain conditions, a particularly violent sneeze can send particles flying 23 to 27 feet away, Bourouiba said.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, weighed in on Bourouiba’s research, emphasizing that most of the risk of transmission still comes from droplets that fall close to the infected person.
“I was disturbed by that report because that’s misleading,” Fauci said in a White House news conference this week, talking about headlines that touted the new safe distance as 27 feet away. "That means that all of a sudden, the six-foot thing doesn’t work. That is a very, very robust, vigorous, achoo sneeze. That’s what that is, and that’s not what we’re talking about.”
If Fauci is walking closer to you, I think 6 feet is enough.
Bourouiba’s lab has produced fascinating slow-motion videos of people sneezing, captured at 2,000 frames per second, that show how far their emissions can spread. Her research over the years has focused in part on the flu, not on the new-in-humans coronavirus that causes COVID-19, but the fluid dynamics of sneezes and coughs still apply, even if the virus’s concentration in emissions and lifespan outside the body could vary between viruses.
Sigh.
It is really starting to look like COVID-19 is a convenient cover and fiction.
The six-feet-away guideline is based on an assumption from research in the 1930s by Harvard sanitary engineer William Firth Wells: that viruses are transmitted through droplets expelled when a carrier coughs or sneezes; and that those transmissions can be classified in two groups: larger droplets, which fall closer to the infected person and really pose a risk only to people who get very close, and smaller droplets, which evaporate before settling on a surface. There are a few inaccuracies there, Bourouiba said.
Better check the anatomy book STAT!
First, the division between large and small droplets is arbitrary, both in classifying their size and in determining how much risk they carry.
Second, a particularly powerful sneeze can send these viral particles, both in droplets and in a puff of gas traveling through the air, flying much farther than six feet. Under the right conditions, they can go 23 to 27 feet, Bourouiba has found.
Call the haz-mat quarantine team and away they go!
Yeah, I smell a puff of gas from somewhere.
Much more research is needed to know for certain how to slow the spread of the virus, Bourouiba said. There’s not enough data now to definitively say what distance is safe, but in the meantime, people can be cautious in public.
They are basing the controlled demolition of the economy and lockdown on something where they don't have enough data and don't know?
Aaaaaaaaa-choo!
“When possible, if it’s a confined space, then maintaining larger distances would be wise,” Bourouiba said. In a hospital setting, health care providers who have access to personal protective equipment may want to put it on as soon as they can when near infected patients, and as governments and hospitals scramble to find more N95 masks and other protective gear, Bourouiba is raising questions about how effective masks are on people already carrying the virus. She pointed out that N95 masks have not been tested to determine how effective they are against repeated sneezes and coughs. More testing needs to be done to determine whether giving a mask to someone who is already infected can protect people nearby, she said.
After Jared Kushner went to all that trouble?
Dr. Daniel Kuritzkes, chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, said the hospital likely won’t dramatically change its existing practices.
“Even before COVID-19, as flu season got underway, we were asking patients who came into the emergency department or a doctor’s visit, if they had symptoms of a cold or flu, to put on a mask,” Kuritzkes said.
People who are carrying the virus but not coughing or sneezing likely don’t post a risk to someone 20 or more feet away, he said, but he did encourage anyone who does have respiratory-related symptoms, like coughing or sneezing, to stay home unless they need urgent medical attention, and if people who have the virus do leave the house — say, to see a doctor — wearing a regular surgical mask (as opposed to an N95 respirator) can help keep others safe.
“I still think that the 6 feet distance is a reasonable, practical measure," Kuritzkes said. "If someone is actively coughing and sneezing, you probably want to keep your distance a little bit more, and of course, outdoors, there’s much less chance of coming into contact with respiratory secretions.”
Make sure you holler leper at them, too.
Shame the sh*t out of them.
--more--"
Customers stood six feet apart outside Trader Joe's supermarket in Boston. (David L. Ryan/Globe Staff)
Mooooooooo!
Making you literally go through hoops for food:
"Hoops And Homework Delivering Food to Those in Need FRAMINGHAM, MA - APRIL 1: Dahiana Acevedo loads up boxes of food inside the Hoops and Homework center that will feed 20 families in Framingham, MA on Apr. 1, 2020. Even though Framingham's after school program Hoops and Homework is closed due to coronavirus, staff is still delivering food twice a week to families. The food comes from Lovin' Spoonfuls who pick up perishable food from grocery stores, produce wholesalers, farms and farmers markets and distribute it to more than 160 community nonprofits in Massachusetts. (Photo by Jessica Rinaldi/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
Here is the backboard of the effort, even if the game has been cancelled.
"State’s largest construction union calls for a Monday walkout over coronavirus concerns; As many as 10,000 carpenters are likely to be off the job statewide" by Tim Logan Globe Staff, April 3, 2020
Members of the region’s largest construction workers union are set to walk off the job Monday over mounting worries about coronavirus safety at building sites.
The North Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters is directing its roughly 10,000 members in Massachusetts to stop working, effective Monday, saying it’s essentially impossible to keep construction sites safe from the spread of COVID-19.
“We didn’t come to this conclusion lightly,” said Tom Flynn, the union’s executive secretary-treasurer, “but despite the good intentions of developers, contractors, and subcontractors, nothing we’ve seen has been able to ensure the safety of our members, or workers at other sites.”
It’s the strongest move yet by construction unions worried about safety on job sites, where workers often share trailers, portable toilets, and close quarters. The Massachusetts Building Trades Council — an umbrella group of skilled trades unions — has urged Governor Charlie Baker to implement a statewide construction shutdown, as states including Pennsylvania and Washington have done, even as some of the council’s workers remain on jobs around the region.
By separating us into two-tiers (like before the French Revolution), they have inadvertently empowered the "e$$ential" cla$$ of workers. I suppose they thought the workers would be so scared they would be totally complaint just to have work. Oops.
Boston and Cambridge have largely stopped projects in their cities, citing the challenges of containing the easily-spread virus, but work continues in many suburban towns. In some cases, there are more workers than ever on site as contractors bring in those who have been furloughed from jobs in the city.
Last week, the Baker administration issued safety guidelines to encourage separation, and better sanitation, on construction sites. Earlier this week, it said work on office buildings and other commercial projects should be halted, but — citing Massachusetts’ longstanding housing shortage — Baker has told residential developers they can keep building. He has said work can also continue on health care projects, roadwork, and essential infrastructure.
Safety monitoring is largely left up to municipal governments.....
Another unfunded mandate?
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They should keep working because it is time to help house health care workers and we need all hands on deck now, or have they not heard?
"After instructing employees to wrap their hands in plastic bags and go back to work, GameStop shuts down Mass. stores" by Katie Johnston Globe Staff,April 3, 2020
GameStop has closed all its stores in Massachusetts, after instructing employees last week to wrap their hands in plastic bags and give customers their orders through a crack in the door.
The business does not provide an essential service and is not allowed to offer curbside pickup during the coronavirus pandemic, according to the state, which ordered all nonessential businesses to shut down as of March 24, and yet GameStop continued operating, allowing customers who couldn’t make online orders to pay for and pick up games at the door.
Join the rest of us.
If there were no gloves, employees were instructed via e-mail to “lightly (you want to be able to get it off easily) tape a Game Stop plastic bag over your hand and arm. Do not open the door all the way — keep the glass between you and the guest’s face — just reach out your arm,” but after operating for several days in violation of the state's shutdown order, on Tuesday the inspectional services department for the City of Boston ordered the Dorchester store to close immediately. No fine was issued but a nuisance order was issued and the inspector visited the store on Wednesday to ensure it had not reopened, according to the city. On Thursday, GameStop confirmed that it had closed all its stores in Massachusetts but did not respond to further questions.
It's unclear if the company is still operating in other states.
GameStop, which is based in Grapevine, Texas, and operates more than 5,500 stores worldwide, according to its website, has been struggling in recent years as gamers increasingly play online, but chief executive George Sherman said last week that with millions of Americans stuck at home for the past few weeks, demand for video games had increased. “The COVID-19 outbreak has led to changes in how consumers work, play, and learn,” he said in a statement. “While still early, we are pleased with the progress we have made to date in our initiatives to stabilize, optimize, and transform the business.”
Then they ARE essential!
--more--"
Same as the war machine:
"Union calls for two-week shutdown after three GE workers test positive" by Katie Johnston Globe Staff, April 3, 2020
The union at the General Electric aviation plant in Lynn is calling for a two-week shutdown after at least three of its members tested positive for COVID-19, according to IUE-CWA Local 201, which represents about 1,260 workers at the facility.
All three of the employees suffering from the highly contagious coronavirus worked in close contact with other people, the union said, and news of the latest positive test on Wednesday night prompted some workers to walk off the job and take sick time on the spot.
Isn't that fireable?
The employees at the Lynn plant build jet and helicopter engines for the US military and have been deemed essential workers.
GE has been under fire from the union for not adequately cleaning shared work areas between shifts, not providing protective equipment, and not offering extra sick time for people exposed to or exhibiting symptoms of COVID-19. The union also said the company should be doing more to keep workers at least six feet away from each other.
I love the turn of phrase puns, and what will they do with the new restrictions being 27 feet?
This week, GE announced it was enacting a number of new safety provisions, including, beginning Monday, performing temperature checks on every person entering the facility. Those who have temperatures of 100.4 degrees or above will be directed to go home and contact their doctor, and use existing sick time to recover.
Union members get 40 hours of paid sick time a year, the state minimum. The company is giving additional time off to those who are medically quarantined or test positive for COVID-19.
In addition to the temperature checks, every Friday night GE will close key manufacturing and assembly areas for intensive cleaning and disinfection, and keep these areas closed through Sunday night. The company is also providing masks for employees who work in tight quarters or who are involved in taking employee temperatures, and is upgrading time clocks to touchless scanners in its manufacturing shops, but the union says these measures don’t go far enough and won’t protect those who may have already been exposed to their infected coworkers. Closing the plant for two weeks would allow more time to properly implement these new measures and secure more safety protocols, the union said.
Where did they get the masks?
I think manufacturers and government are sitting on them, to be released after the crisis with a corresponding raise in market price.
“GE needs time obviously to get the place set up right, so the union’s position is: send everybody home with pay, give us two weeks to work with you to make the place safe, and then bring people back,” said Adam Kaszynski, president of Local 201. “Our people are in danger right now.”
In a letter to employees earlier this week, the company wrote: “Our number one priority is and always will be employee health and safety, and we continue to evaluate and improve the safety protocols that enable our facility to continue to provide essential, mission-critical equipment to the Armed Forces.”
At least animals don't lie to each other.
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Related:
"The longest stretch of American job creation on record came to a halt last month, the Labor Department reported Friday, another reflection of the coronavirus pandemic that has brought the economy to a virtual standstill. Compared with the astounding numbers of people recently applying for unemployment benefits — nearly 10 million in the previous two weeks — the figure announced Friday was less striking: a loss of 701,000 jobs, but the data was mostly collected in the first half of the month, before stay-at-home orders began to cover much of the nation. “As bad as this report is, next month will be many orders of magnitude worse,” said Michael Gapen, chief U.S. economist at Barclays. “This is the initial slippage of the labor market.” He said the March unemployment rate of 4.4 percent could rise to 13 percent in April. The decline in employment last month was the biggest monthly drop since the depths of the Great Recession in 2008-9....."
As usual, Disney leads the way:
"Federal aid for small business off to a slow start; Banks said they’ve time to prepare for the flood of requests from companies hurt by the coronavirus shutdown" by Jon Chesto Globe Staff, April 3, 2020
The first major federal program to help companies slammed by the coronavirus shutdown got off to a rocky start Friday as many small-business managers applying for bank loans were told they would need to wait a few days.
Just adding in$ult to injury!
The banks never have to wait for their loot.
The banking industry braced for a tidal wave of applications for the $349 billion Paycheck Protection Program approved by Congress last week, but many bankers called for patience, saying it might take days to begin processing loans. Guidance from the federal government didn’t arrive until Thursday night, and many banks did not have time to re-engineer their systems for the Friday launch.
Sorry, I'm a bit out of that right now, along with money, and I'm sick of the excu$es.
The program is aimed at preventing businesses from laying off workers while the nation goes into self-imposed shutdown to contain the spread of COVID-19. Companies with 500 or fewer employees can borrow as much as $10 million, depending on the size of their workforce, with a 1-percent interest rate; much or all of the debt would be forgiven if they keep workers on their payrolls for a eight week period.
The Trump administration said the money would be doled out on a first-come, first-serve basis, fueling the intense rush to apply before the program runs out.
They are not going to discriminate, and it will be a bonanza for the kleptocrats.
Evan Falchuk, chief executive of Boston-based human service provider VillagePlan, said he called nearly 10 banks on Friday. None were accepting applications yet, and Falchuk is worried the federal money will dry up before he has a chance to borrow.
“Pretty much every small and mid-sized business in America needs that, given what’s happening right now,” Falchuk said. “The tone among business folks I know is frustration and some anger that the government doesn’t have this worked out.”
That guy once ran for governor.
Bank responses were widely uneven throughout the day on Friday. Some were processing applications, but many said it would not be possible until next week.
“I think everyone is going to have a hard time doing this [quickly] because we have such a short turnaround time,” said Quincy Miller, president of Eastern Bank.
Miller said Eastern set up an online portal to collect customers’ information in advance, and the bank planned to start processing applications early next week. He expects Eastern’s typical loan size will be around $100,000; the bank had fielded thousands of requests during the past two weeks.
Citizens Bank, the second largest in Massachusetts, also created a web page for customers to leave information and be contacted later. Other local banks had notices on their websites advising customers to check back regularly for updates.
Berkshire Bank plans to start processing applications Monday. The bank needed time to adjust its internal operations to the new federal guidelines. “This is our time to step up and help,” said Greg Poehlmann, senior vice president at Berkshire. “We just want to do it right.”
Some banks were able to pull it off, though. By Friday evening, the US Small Business Administration said more than 13,000 loans had been approved, with a value of $4.3 billion.
Bank of America was among the first major banks to do so, with its window opening at 9 a.m. on Friday. By 4 p.m., the bank had begun processing more than 75,000 applications, totaling more than $7 billion in requests; however, BofA, the largest lender in Massachusetts, said it is limiting access for now to existing business customers that have both a checking and lending relationship with the bank. As a result, numerous entrepreneurs pilloried the bank on Twitter, after their applications had been rejected. A spokesman said BofA will soon begin to respond to small-business customers that don’t have a borrowing relationship with the bank.
At least two local community banks said they were accepting applications on Friday. South Shore Bank chief executive Jim Dunphy said he will have 15 people working through the weekend to process loans.
Perhaps the biggest question is how long the money will last. Joe Campanelli, CEO of Needham Bank, said he has heard anywhere from hours to weeks. His bank was taking newcomers as well as existing clients: “We’re not going to pick and choose [which company is] going to survive," but many experts, such as attorney Jeff Morlend at law firm Sullivan & Worcester, were advising clients to stick with their current banks, to ease the processing time, in part because the banks are already familiar with the businesses and have their information on file. “Time is critical,” he said.
The National Federation of Independent Business estimated half of all small businesses can’t last more than one or two months under the current conditions. “Business owners can’t wait any longer,” said Chris Carlozzi, NFIB’s Massachusetts director. “They need some sort of relief immediately.”
Rockland Trust chief executive Chris Oddleifson said he expects to begin accepting applications within a few days, and, not a moment too soon, as he doesn’t expect the $349 billion to last long.
“The demand is huge, absolutely huge,” Oddleifson said. “I’ve got people who are going through friends to [reach] me, getting texts, emails, phone calls. It’s coming at me from all different directions, fast and furious.”
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None of those loans(!) are going to $ave anyone. The party is over.
I hope you have in$urance:
"Mass. health insurers offer help during coronavirus crisis; The companies, led by Harvard Pilgrim, have collectively donated millions of dollars over the last two weeks" by Jon Chesto Globe Staff, April 2, 2020
The state’s biggest nonprofit health insurers are waiving copays and deductibles for COVID-19 treatments, but they’re also giving back to their communities in numerous ways, to help individuals and organizations deal with the financial repercussions of the coronavirus pandemic.
Kicking back some chump change as they lay people off?
Wellesley-based Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, for example, said its foundation is giving more than $3 million to COVID-19 relief efforts, spread across four New England states. That figure includes $1 million to local community service groups, to help them respond to the pandemic, and $500,000 to local nonprofits that assist older adults. Another $1 million is going to grants to provide food, transportation and other essentials.
Tufts Health Plan, based in Watertown, said its foundation committed $1 million to various organizations affected by the coronavirus outbreak. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, based in Boston, committed $100,000 to the Boston Resiliency Fund and another $150,000 to similar relief efforts across the state, as well as $50,000 to various organizations with whom Blue Cross had to cancel employee volunteer projects. Among other things, Blue Cross launched an online giving platform for employees who want to contribute to COVID-19 efforts, and will match those gifts, dollar-for-dollar. Blue Cross is also redirecting $1.4 million of its existing 2020 charitable giving, toward COVID-19 support efforts.
Fallon Health, the smallest of the state’s four major nonprofit insurers, said it is pledging $25,000 to people and groups affected by the pandemic in the Worcester area, its home base, through the Worcester Together initiative.....
It looks like they will be doling out the dough to the u$ual suspects.
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