March 15, 2020
A LETTER TO OUR RESIDENTS FROM OUR CEO:
At Avenue Living Communities, we are home to 20,000 people across the Prairies. We own and operate 430 buildings with approximately 10,000 units in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. The people who call Avenue Living home are the heartland's workforce: they work at Walmart, Costco and Super-store, in hospitals and factories, they keep deliveries running on time and keep our communities clean. Our residents are essentially working on the front lines during this deeply unsettling time.
Our duty to you, our residents, is our highest priority above all else. One of the core beliefs that Avenue Living was founded on is "Duty of Care." This enduring value guides us as we face the rapidly evolving challenge of coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Our hearts go out to everyone who has been affected by this unprecedented event and we appreciate the healthcare workers, local communities and governments, here in Canada and around the world, who are actively working to contain this virus.
Please know that we are working around the clock to ensure your health and safety. We have always taken great pride in our clean and well-run buildings, and we know this is more important than ever right now. We also want to assure you that Avenue Living team members are still putting on their uniforms every day. Our mission, during good times and bad, is to provide reliable, safe and comfortable accommodations that you can call home.
On top of our daily cleaning procedures, we're adding steps to make our routines even more rigorous. This means more time will be spent cleaning and increasing our level of disinfectant and sanitization of our properties and offices. This includes high-level touch points such as door handles, elevator buttons, light switches and intercom buttons. We are also retaining visitor logs of everyone visiting our offices and our properties for suite viewings.
Like many others, we're taking our guidance from the Public Health Agency of Canada, which recommends increased cleaning as one of the most important preventative measures we can take. Although there are no known cases of COVID-19 among our residents, we encourage you to use our electronic payment and renewal procedures as social distancing options. And, out of an abundance of caution, we've stopped hosting open house events at our buildings and all planned spring community events are temporarily postponed.
We are also committed to taking care of our team members in each of our 19 markets across the Prairies. We have been providing them with up-to-the-moment guidance and information so that they can keep themselves and their families safe. We're encouraging high-risk individuals and sick team members to stay home and have stopped all non-essential business travel. Also, to support our team members in real-time, we've set up a forum where we are sharing information and taking questions 24/7.
Our purpose has always been to create a high standard of consistent quality, delivered safely across all operations. This is why we'll be diligently working to continue providing you and your families with a healthy, high-quality place to call home.
We are continuing to monitor this rapidly evolving situation and will keep providing updates on our strategy to protect your health and well-being. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us at COVID-19@avenueliving.ca.
Sincerely,
Anthony Giuffre
Founder and CEO, Avenue Living