Yankees in First with WELL Heath-Safety Rating Designation
The new rating system from the International WELL Building Institute aims to help stadiums and arenas become safer in the time of COVID-19.
The big ballpark in the Bronx became the first professional sports venue to become WELL Heath-Safety certified, according to the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI), a designation that aims to provide a blueprint for safe operations during the pandemic.
The initiative, launched in June by the IWBI, was developed with guidance from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), among others. The WELL Health-Safety Rating provides operational policies, maintenance protocols, emergency plans and stakeholder engagement strategies to help organizations prepare and maintain their spaces for re-entry in a post COVID-19 environment.
The Yankees were one of over 100 organizations, encompassing over 500 venues, to enroll in the program and were the first to receive the designation.
“Working with IWBI to achieve the WELL Health-Safety Rating allowed us to focus and implement the most effective and efficient methods known to help mitigate the risk of COVID-19 transmission in both a workplace setting and a place where the general public will eventually gather again,” Yankees senior vice president of stadium operations Doug Behar said in a statement.
The certification is based on five primary criteria: Air and water quality management; cleaning and sanitation procedures; emergency preparedness programs; health service resources and stakeholder engagement and communications, according to a press release from the IWBI.
“The Yankees already had many of these strategies in place and used the WELL Health-Safety Rating to further strengthen their COVID-19 response and to document and verify these actions with our third party reviewer GBCI,” Rachel Gutter, IWBI president, said in a statement. “As a result, players, staff and fans can feel confident that the Yankees have implemented our research-backed strategies to provide a safer and healthier environment to play ball.”
And play ball they have, although not quite up pre-season expectations. Following prize off-season acquisition Gerrit Cole’s first loss in over a year on Wednesday, the Yankees currently sit in second place in the AL East, chasing Tampa Bay by 2.5 games roughly halfway through the abbreviated 60-game season.