Government agencies closed for COVID-19. Here’s how they plan to reopening, hold meetings
As more Whatcom County residents are vaccinated against COVID-19, government agencies are moving toward reopening their offices to the public and returning to in-person meetings.
While Whatcom County and Bellingham officials are cautious in the face of continued high infection rates countywide, the county’s smaller cities are pushing toward business as usual after a year of office closures and online meetings to limit the spread of the new coronavirus.
“We are fully opened up right now,” Sumas Mayor Kyle Christensen told The Bellingham Herald in an email.
In Nooksack, the city Council resumed in-person meetings on March 15 but city offices are mostly closed, said Virginia Arnason, the city’s clerk-treasurer.
“The public and council members can attend the meetings in person or via Zoom,” Arnason told The Herald in an email. “We are still in discussion on opening the doors completely. At the present time we do limited in-person business as needed.”
Data released this week show that Whatcom County is on track to reach the 70% vaccination milestone by the end of the month.
Blaine, Everson, Ferndale and Lynden also have a mix of in-person and remote services, their officials told The Herald in emails.
“(Lynden city offices) are now open for business,” Mayor Scott Korthuis said.
“City Council is meeting remotely, but I’m pretty sure we will have a discussion on this in the near future. Likely to move to in-person next month,” Korthuis said June 1.
Everson Mayor John Perry said City Hall has been open to in-person services for several months.
“We have continued to make modifications to our policies and procedures throughout the last year and have reopened city hall to all services, with a few changes to our procedures,” Perry said. “Our council meetings are open to the public as of last month, but we are still offering attendance via Zoom. Some of our staff and council members are still using this option.”
Blaine City Manager Michael Jones said city offices had a “soft” reopening Tuesday, June 1, after the Memorial Day weekend.
City Hall and other offices are open 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. weekdays, Jones said.
“We can still provide nearly all services remotely as we’ve been doing for the past year. We recommend that customers use those remote options for convenience, environmental reasons, and for virus control, but we are open for in-person service as well,” he said.
“We have not established a date for when our City Council and various boards and commissions will resume in-person meetings. We are taking one step at a time,” Jones said.
Ferndale city offices also will be open limited hours — 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays at first, and aiming for regular business hours by the end of June, said spokesman Riley Sweeney.
“If you haven’t been fully vaccinated, please wear a face mask for your safety and the safety of our employees,” Sweeney said.
But Bellingham and Whatcom County — with vastly larger workforces and multiple office buildings — are moving more slowly to ease pandemic restrictions.
“Plans are in the works to safely reopen county offices,” said Jed Holmes, spokesman for Whatcom County Executive Satpal Sidhu.
“Due to the structure of county government, which includes a number of offices overseen by independently elected officials as well as courts supervised by judges, our steps toward reopening may not be uniform in time and character for each office and department,” Holmes said in an email.
County officials will seek guidance from the state Department of Labor & Industries regarding staff safety and also to the state’s Roadmap to Recovery for capacity constraints and social-distancing requirements, he said.
Bellingham Mayor Seth Fleetwood said at a May 24 City Council meeting that reopening will be “more like a dial than a switch,” under guidance from L&I and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We’ll be thoughtful and methodical,” Fleetwood said.
Brian Heinrich, the city’s deputy administrator, said plans are still being developed.
“It will take time to fully implement and most, if not all, city services are currently available to the public such as online payments, permit questions, and facility reservations to name a few,” Heinrich said.
