As states around the country move to restart their economies, they are reopening industries that Oregon never closed.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown took a very different approach to her March shutdown order than other states. She directed some businesses to close – bars and restaurants, most prominently – but allowed most other sectors to continue operating so long as they could maintain safe distances among their workers and customers.
The governor specifically allowed construction and manufacturing to continue operating through the coronavirus outbreak. Brown gave many other businesses the latitude to make their own decisions, provided they followed her rules on safe distancing.
Health experts and business leaders applaud the governor’s approach, noting that Oregon has suffered relatively few large workplace outbreaks – with the notable exception of the healthcare and nursing care sectors. Brown’s office said the state’s experience operating since March informed her plans to restart many other industries that she announced Thursday.
Workers, though, are clearly alarmed. The state fielded has fielded more than 3,700 complaints about employers allegedly violating coronavirus safety standards. The state hasn’t penalized any companies yet but has indicated that some enforcement actions are close.
There have been at least two large workplace outbreaks outside the healthcare sector, at food processing facilities in Astoria and Albany.
County health officials say workplace outbreaks likely explain the comparatively high rate of infections within Oregon’s Latino community, which frequently works in relatively low-paid, frontline jobs.
Still, it’s not clear that the decision to let more businesses operate has provided big economic benefits. Oregon has shed 380,000 jobs during the outbreak. That’s comparable to the layoff rates in other states.
Many businesses have chosen to close or scale back on their own, without a government mandate, either to protect workers and customers or simply because there aren’t enough customers to justify continued operations.
That suggests reopening more businesses may not solve Oregon’s economic woes – at least not until the pandemic is under control and consumer confidence returns.
Regardless, the apparently low rate of infections compared to other states suggests the governor’s strategy for letting businesses continue to operate hasn’t been a major drawback to public health.
“The proof is in the pudding, isn’t it? We have not had as many cases as most states. So we’re doing something right,” said John Townes, director of infection prevention and control at Oregon Health & Science University.
Safe workplaces
Business during the coronavirus epidemic has looked far different in Oregon than in other states. Kentucky and Ohio, for example, each shut down manufacturing and construction when they adopted stay-home orders and are just lifting those restrictions now.
In Oregon, by contrast, commercial and residential construction continued even as bars, restaurants, boutiques and many other businesses were ordered shut. Intel, Precision Castparts and Qorvo, among others, acknowledged at least one coronavirus infections apiece among their workers but kept their factories humming.
It’s not clear the workers at those businesses contracted the infection on the job and it doesn’t appear the virus spread widely within those companies.
Daimler Trucks North America shuttered its Swan Island plant for nearly a month after shutdowns in other regions disrupted its parts supply. The plant reopened April 20 after Daimler redesigned the facility and its production line to ensure workers remain at least six feet from one another.
Semiconductor equipment manufacturer Lam Research briefly shuttered its big Tualatin factory after two employees received preliminary COVID-19 diagnoses. Lam reopened after a thorough cleaning and after consulting with public health authorities on safety practices.
While the coronavirus is highly contagious and potentially deadly, Townes said it is possible to work safely. He still goes to the office at OHSU and said he feels secure and comfortable.
Employers need to ensure workers have protections, he said, like adequate spacing, proper ventilation, paid sick leave, plexiglass screens when dealing with customers, and masks when around other people, Townes said. He said workers need to stay home if they’re feeling sick.
“Employers have a responsibility to create conditions were exposure is not going to occur and employees have a responsibility to do things to prevent transmission as well, like staying home when you’re sick,” Townes said. “It’s a covenant in a way.”
Outbreaks at work
Workers have flooded the state’s Occupational Safety and Health division (Oregon OSHA) with concerns their employers aren’t keeping up their end of the bargain. The 3,700 complaints are dominated by concerns workers aren’t adequately spaced.
The healthcare industry has the greatest number of complaints and hundreds of workers have been infected statewide. Workplace infection appears to be an issue in other sectors, too.
The National Frozen Foods plant in Albany closed last month after a coronavirus outbreak that has now spread to 30 workers and four family members. At least 26 workers tested positive for the coronavirus at Bornstein Seafoods facilities in Astoria, which closed following the outbreak but reopened Tuesday.
The Oregon Health Authority is tracking workplace infections but hasn’t disclosed how many it has recorded or what fields they take place in. Washington County has logged 29 cases at 29 businesses outside the healthcare sectors. Those include agriculture, retail, manufacturing and restaurants, which are allowed to continue operating with takeout and delivery service.
About half of Washington County’s coronavirus cases are among Latino workers, four times their share of the county’s population. Mary Sawyers, spokeswoman for Washington County Public Health, said workplace exposure likely explains the discrepancy.
Latinos dominate many frontline jobs in agriculture, food processing and food service and she said those sectors have to keep operating to keep people fed through the pandemic.
“We believe that is part of the issue is that many people have to go into work,” Sawyers said. “They can’t really stay home and that’s one of the reasons why that population might be more exposed because there are more of those in those essential jobs.”
Marion County, the heart of Oregon’s farmworker population, has an unusually high rate of positive coronavirus tests – which advocates say could be linked labor conditions in agricultural work.
Oregon OSHA issued new rules last week designed to protect farmworkers by requiring more protective equipment and spacing – including while in transit to job sites and while they are living in employer-provided accommodations.
The Oregon Farm Bureau warned that the new rules are more burdensome than what the state’s industries face. The farm bureau said the state didn’t allow enough time to adjust to the rules, which it said are impractical in places where there aren’t good housing alternatives available.
But Reyna Lopez, executive director of Oregon’s Farmworker Union, said agricultural laborers don’t deserve second-class working conditions.
“Providing these measures, as simple as they sound, it’s going to reduce harm,” Lopez said. As in other industries, she said, workers may still fall ill during the pandemic. But she said the new rules put farmworkers on a more equal footing.
“I don’t think we’re going to get to the point where 100% nobody’s going to get sick,” Lopez said. “This is a first good step toward taking people safe.”
A long recovery
Sandi McDonough is CEO of Oregon Business & Industry, the state’s largest business organization. She said the governor was wise to take a different path from other states by specifying a small number of sectors that must close, instead of a small number of sectors that may stay open.
“I think the way Gov. Brown did the closures actually worked out well,” McDonough said. She said the governor consulted with the business community before issuing her stay-home order and listened to its guidance on how employers could operate safely.
Washington and California each made major adjustments to their stay-home policies soon after issuing their orders, confusing businesses and workers. McDonough said Brown’s approach avoided that.
“It was generally cleaner,” she said.
It may not have spared Oregon the economic damage other states endured, though. With nearly one in five Oregonians out of a job, and thousands of businesses struggling to cover rent and payroll, McDonough said recovery will be a formidable task.
Precision Castparts, Gunderson and Evraz Steel all scaled back Portland operations amid a steep downturn in demand. Fresh jobless claims data from the Oregon Employment Department show thousands of new layoffs even in white-collar jobs like finance, work that can often be done from home.
Those indicates that the downturn is spreading across the economy and suggests that allowing more to open won’t be enough to overcome the economic catastrophe triggered by the coronavirus pandemic.
“Now the question is, ‘How do we build out of this?’” McDonough said.
-- Mike Rogoway | mrogoway@oregonian.com | twitter: @rogoway |
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