West Miami employee tested positive after coming to work. Why is city hall still open?
During work Wednesday, an employee at West Miami’s small city hall building wasn’t feeling well. The employee left to get tested for COVID-19 and a rapid test came back positive, according to City Manager Yolanda Aguilar.
In other cities in Miami-Dade, that likely would have set off an immediate chain of events: The employee would have been told not to return to city hall. Other city workers who were potentially exposed to the virus would have been sent home to quarantine. City hall would have been closed to the public.
West Miami’s reaction didn’t fit that mold.
The employee who tested positive Wednesday returned to city hall “to report the findings and pick up personal belongings, but was not allowed to stay in the building,” Aguilar told the Miami Herald.
In an email to staff Thursday night, Aguilar said the employee’s belongings were placed outside the front door of City Hall to be retrieved.
Aguilar said the employee’s work station was sanitized, but there has not yet been a deep-clean of the entire building. Those are done monthly.
And the employee’s coworkers remained at city hall. The building was open for business Thursday.
“All is well in West Miami,” Aguilar said in an email Thursday morning.
Countywide rules
The city’s response appeared to contradict countywide rules for workplaces. Those rules say “any establishment that has an on-site employee or contractor who tests positive” must close for 14 days, or until various conditions are met — including a deep sanitizing of the premises, plus COVID tests and medical clearances for all employees who may have been exposed.
Regarding the county rules, Aguilar said she was “fully aware of the guidelines and yes, they do apply to us.” It wasn’t immediately clear why city hall stayed open or why other employees weren’t told to quarantine.
West Miami Vice Mayor Eric Diaz-Padron said he was surprised to hear that city hall was open after a COVID-positive employee was there. He had stopped by to pick up his mail Wednesday at the front of the building.
“I was not aware of [the sick employee],” he said. “The ultimate goal obviously should be that cities, including ours, take the most conservative reading of the CDC policies and make sure they are followed to protect the public.”
Diaz-Padron also said he was confused as to why someone who tested positive would have to pick up their belongings instead of having them sent for. The county’s rules say that “under no circumstances shall an employee or contractor who has tested positive report to work ... until that employee is cleared by a medical professional as being COVID-19 free.”
Aguilar said the employee had tested negative for COVID this past weekend. “It was only yesterday that the employee complained about not feeling well. Immediately after the employee reported for duty in the morning, I asked the employee to leave and re-test,” she said.
She added that the city has adopted a modified work schedule that allows employees to work from home once a week through the end of December, to ensure that “physical distancing guidelines are observed.”
The ground floor of West Miami City Hall houses the city’s administrative services, with a waiting area, a conference room, offices and a pod of desks that is separated from the public by glass due to COVID-19.
“It’s not a very big space,” former state Rep. Javier Fernandez, whose district included West Miami, told the Herald last week. “If you’re COVID positive, there’s no way to walk through there without having contact with others.”
After this story published online, the city issued a notice Thursday evening that the City Hall building where the employee works would close Friday for deep cleaning and sanitizing and reopen Monday.
In an email to city staff Thursday night, Aguilar said the employee “has been asked to stay home, follow the CDC guidelines, consult with the doctor and provide a negative PCR result to the city before returning to work.”
New case follows recent city hall outbreak
The latest positive test came 14 days after West Miami closed city hall because seven out of approximately 10 employees in the building had contracted COVID-19.
City officials initially said the building would stay closed until Dec. 14. But two days later, on Dec. 4, the city announced city hall would instead reopen to the public Dec. 7 following “a careful assessment of our current situation to include negative test results, and extensive sanitizing efforts.”
Aguilar, who was one of the employees to test positive, returned to the office Dec. 9, citing a negative antigen test and the guidance of a doctor. After she returned, Aguilar briefly left work again because a PCR test — which is slower but generally more accurate than the antigen test — had come back positive.
The manager told the Herald she had first felt COVID symptoms on Nov. 27. She initially returned to work 12 days later, which would be consistent with CDC guidelines that say people with mild to moderate symptoms can safely be around others after at least 10 days since symptoms first appeared, regardless of test results.
Aguilar also said Dec. 2 that Mayor Rhonda Rodriguez and city commissioners were isolating at home out of concern about possible exposure from city staff. On Dec. 9, the city held a partially in-person commission meeting on the second floor of city hall, with three commissioners sitting on the dais wearing masks and other officials participating virtually.
West Miami, a majority Cuban-American city of about 8,000 residents where one in five people is 65 or older, was one of the last cities in Miami-Dade to scale back services at city hall at the onset of the pandemic. Aguilar said for the first time on April 1 that the city would employ a “skeleton crew” while others worked from home.
Other cities take more conservative approach
In other cities across Miami-Dade, a positive case at city hall typically leads to a shutdown, testing of staff, sanitizing, or all three.
In Bay Harbor Islands, for example, town hall was immediately closed to the public and deep-cleaned after one employee tested positive for COVID-19 in late October. The building was still used as a voting site five days later, but voting took place on a separate floor.
A Miami Beach spokeswoman, Melissa Berthier, said that if an employee tests positive, they must stay at home for 10 days or 20 days depending on the severity of their symptoms, which mirrors CDC guidance.
“They may be released to return to the workplace if their symptoms have significantly improved, if they provide a negative PCR test result and with clearance from their physician,” Berthier said. She added that close contacts with employees who test positive are told to quarantine for seven days, and then can return to work “if they have no symptoms and provide a negative PCR test result, taken from five to eight days after exposure.”
In other cities contacted by the Herald, including Palmetto Bay, Cutler Bay, Pinecrest and South Miami, officials said COVID-positive employees are sent home to isolate for 10 days or longer. All employees who have close contact with positive staff members are tested.
Palmetto Bay Village Hall is sanitized regularly on Saturdays and also on days an employee tests positive, officials said. Cutler Bay Town Hall and recreation center get a deep clean every Saturday, too.
Cutler Bay employees are tested after any report of an exposure in town hall, as well as regularly every three or four months through a town partnership with MD Now Urgent Care.
In Homestead, officials said office areas, common areas and city vehicles are cleaned upon news of a COVID-positive employee. The city also conducts its own contact tracing to notify employees who may have been exposed and sends them to get tested.
Under the county rules, establishments with multiple floors or structures, or that are larger than 10,000 square feet, can limit the deep sanitizing and the testing and isolation of employees to the particular floor or area where the COVID-positive employee worked.
In Cutler Bay, for example, town hall has not had to completely shut down due to employees testing positive, but the town has shut down whole departments or divisions where the employees work closely.
Diaz-Padron, the West Miami vice mayor, said in order to keep the process uniform and ensure the safety of employees and members of the public, “cities should just follow the guidelines set by the county and the federal government.”
Miami Herald staff writer Martin Vassolo contributed to this report.
This story was updated after it was published online to reflect that the city of West Miami took measures to sanitize the work area of the employee who tested positive for COVID and sent communication to employees about it.
This story was originally published December 17, 2020 at 4:33 PM.
