Governor Murphy announced on Wednesday, April 8, 2020, an Executive Order (“EO”) that will impact business operations across the State of New Jersey. A copy of the Executive Order can be found at: https://nj.gov/infobank/eo/056murphy/pdf/EO-122.pdf
New Guidelines for “Non-Essential Construction“:
Per the EO, all non-essential construction operations in NJ must be shut down at 8 PM on 4-10-2020. Below is the definition for “essential construction” that may remain operational. The EO also requires construction projects that remain active to adopt special social distancing and cleanliness standards.
- Projects necessary for the delivery of health care services, including but not limited to hospitals, other health care facilities, and pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities;
- Transportation projects, including roads, bridges, and mass transit facilities or physical infrastructure, including work done at airports or seaports;
- Utility projects, including those necessary for energy and electricity production and transmission, and any decommissioning of facilities used for electricity generation;
- Residential projects that are exclusively designated as affordable housing;
- Projects involving pre-K-12 schools, including but not limited to projects in Schools Development Authority districts, and projects involving higher education facilities;
- Projects already underway involving individual single-family homes, or an individual apartment unit where an individual already resides, with a construction crew of 5 or fewer individuals. This includes additions to single-family homes such as solar panels;
- Projects already underway involving a residential unit for which a tenant or buyer has already entered into a legally binding agreement to occupy the unit by a certain date, and construction is necessary to ensure the unit’s availability by that date;
- Projects involving facilities at which any one or more of the following takes place: the manufacture, distribution, storage, or servicing of goods or products that are sold by online retail businesses or essential retail businesses, as defined by Executive Order No. 107 (2020) and subsequent Administrative Orders adopted pursuant to that Order;
- Projects involving data centers or facilities that are critical to a business’s ability to function;
- Projects necessary for the delivery of essential social services, including homeless shelters;
- Any project necessary to support law enforcement agencies or first responder units in their response to the COVID-19 emergency;
- Any project that is ordered or contracted for by Federal, State, county, or municipal government, or any project that must be completed to meet a deadline established by the Federal government;
- Any work on a non-essential construction project that is required to physically secure the site of the project, ensure the structural integrity of any buildings on the site, abate any hazards that would exist on the site if the construction were to remain in its current condition, remediate a site, or otherwise ensure that the site and any buildings therein are appropriately protected and safe during the suspension of the project; and
- Any emergency repairs necessary to ensure the health and safety of residents.
New Guidelines for Essential Retail Stores:
All essential retail must indefinitely limit the number of customers in their stores to 50 percent of their approved capacity.Customers and employees must wear face coverings. Stores must provide special shopping hours for high-risk individuals, erect physical barriers between customers and cashiers and baggers where practicable, and regularly sanitize areas used by their employees.
New Guidelines for Warehouses and Manufacturing Facilities:
The order will also put greater protections in place for the workers in warehouses and in manufacturing and will required social distancing to be practiced to its fullest extent.
About Duane Morris:
Duane Morris has created a COVID-19 Strategy Team to help organizations plan, respond to and address this fast-moving situation. Please see our COVID-19 site or contact your Duane Morris attorney for more information. Prior Alerts on the topic are available on the team’s webpage.
For Further Information:
If you have any questions about this Alert, please contact Brad A. Molotsky, Paul Josephson, Elizabeth Mincer, James Greenberg, or any member of our COVID-19 Strategy Team or the attorney in the firm with whom you are regularly in contact.