As the statewide mask mandate is about to expire, a poll of Birmingham Business Alliance members shows companies divided over the best path forward. Some are not ready to lift COVID-19 safeguards quite yet.
“Lifting or continuing the mask requirement is a tough decision for our state and local elected officials and we understand the gravity of those decisions,” said Ron Kitchens, CEO of the Birmingham Business Alliance. “As you can see from the results below, our local businesses and service providers feel the weight of those decisions, too, and have provided great input that we’ll continue to share with our public and elected leaders through our public policy efforts.”
You can read the full results here.
Slightly more than half of the companies responding indicated they will continue requirements for their employees to mask up. One company said it will leave the decision up to individual employees; another that: “Until all of our employees have had a chance to receive a vaccine plus waiting period, all COVID precautions remain.”
But the split was both opposite and stronger as to whether customers would be required to wear masks — 185 companies, or 60%, said they would not require customers to mask, compared to 121 companies, or 40%, that said they would.
On other questions, business owners anticipate that they would or might encounter resistance from customers if they required them to mask and that a continuation of the state mask mandate would or might be helpful. Some 28% of respondents said a continued mask mandate would be harmful to their business.
More than 300 companies, representing more than half the BBA member companies, participated in the survey.
More about COVID-19 safeguards here.
