Eric Lecky

ERIC LECKY

We are navigating a new world, living in unexpected times with significant shifts in our daily way of life, both personally and professionally. COVID-19 has undoubtedly caused the country, and Hawaii, to make extraordinary changes in how we interact with family, friends, customers and colleagues. This uncertainty raises numerous questions about emergency preparedness, continuity of operations, what’s safe and what’s not, how to keep workers employed, companies afloat and customers feeling reassured and secure.

When the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, along with local state/county orders, provided guidance on critical infrastructure services, replacing failing plumbing fell within the definition of an essential service. As this article is being written, this categorization has allowed SageWater to continue working on projects during these challenging times. It also validates the urgent need to shore up unstable plumbing and provide reliable water service to clients at a time when public health and sanitation is of the utmost importance.

Due to the nature of its business, SageWater is in a unique position because it works inside people’s homes. Typically when it works inside a condominium unit, residents are at work during the day. But with the stayat-home or shelter-in-place orders, SageWater is faced with working in units where residents are home, and more people are onsite at the communities all day, every day.

As you can imagine, the company had to be very proactive to stay ahead of mandates, acting quickly to communicate with employees, clients, inspectors and local government officials about how it planned to continue operations during COVID-19 while protecting their employees and the communities they serve. They focused on a few key areas: providing leadership in a time of uncertainty, ensuring the safety, health and welfare of their employees, as well as the residents in every unit workers enter, reviewing and handling contractual matters, providing project continuity to meet client needs, and ensuring an ample pipeline of not only plumbing materials, but the newly required personal protective equip

ment (PPE) necessary to enhance the safety of everyone involved.

Though SageWater’s response to COVID-19 is continuing to evolve, the following list outlines what company leaders have learned and put in place to support and protect their employees and clients during this time, while enabling repipe projects that provide critical infrastructure to continue. • Identified and designated an internal crisis management response team to serve as the primary resource for developing company communications for employees, clients, residents, partners, inspectors and other key stakeholders. • Communicated and disseminated information quickly and clearly to everyone affected. • Ensured they were complying with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and World Health Organization best practices, as well as all federal, state and local guidance and executive orders. • Implemented procedural changes to safeguard clients and workforce to reduce the likelihood of spreading disease, communicating those requirements openly and effectively so that everyone involved felt confident and safe. Internal procedures included: • On a jobsite, required strict social distancing, including staggering of crew breaks, arrivals and departures to avoid having more than 10 people in one place at one time. • Every morning before starting work for the day, SageWater required all employees to undergo a non-in

vasive health screening, including a visual inspection by a manager and a temperature reading. Anyone with an elevated temperature (more than 100.4) or who showed signs of being sick was immediately sent home and not allowed to work until they’re without a fever for at least 24 hours. • All employees in the field were required to wear a protective mask and protective gloves at all times while working on the jobsite to help mitigate the potential of an employee being asymptomatic and coughing, sneezing or otherwise contaminating their surrounding environment unintentionally. • Project managers employed additional sanitization procedures to disinfect any surfaces that may have been touched during the work in each unit each day. • All employees were required to follow CDC recommendations for strict social distancing and self-isolation outside of work, minimizing exposure by limiting movements to the

home and the jobsite, staying out of bars, restaurants, gyms, movie theaters etc., and going out only in limited circumstances as advised by the CDC. • Any subcontractors supporting SageWater projects were held to the same standards as employees. • For office-based workers, SageWater strongly encouraged all employees to work from home and made sure they were all technologically enabled to do so.

The feedback from some of SageWater’s clients to their emergency preparedness procedures emphasized that the approach seemed to be successful. “SageWater is the gold standard for how to handle communications and continuity of operations during a time of crisis,” said Ron Falter, board president at Yacht Harbor Towers, a current SageWater repipe client.

While far from over, the impact of the COVID-19 virus has reinforced the importance of emergency preparedness and crisis response and communication.

One key lesson learned so far: You must be agile and willing to adjust your response during a continually evolving situation, and communicate often and with transparency any changes to your procedures to all critical parties. SageWater is continuing to evolve its response to COVID-19 as needed, and trusts that while we all are currently facing unprecedented challenges, we will collectively come out on the other side of the wave, having learned important lessons in emergency preparedness that we can hopefully apply to the next major catastrophe, whenever that may come. ❖

Eric Lecky is an executive vice president with SageWater, one of Hawaii’s leading pipe replacement contractors. Since 1988, SageWater has successfully replaced more than 35 million feet of pipe in over 100,000 occupied residences. Reach him at elecky@sagewater.com.

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