SunCommon to require COVID-19 vaccines for employees

August 14 , 2021  |  By Lisa Scagliotti

SunCommon workers stand out on the roads driving energy-efficient vehicles from their fleet that bears the company's colorful branding. SunCommon photo

This week SunCommon co-presidents Duane Peterson and James Moore announced to their 200 employees that they must get vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus to continue working for the company with few exceptions. 

The Waterbury-based solar energy systems provider has put its workers on notice to provide documentation that they are vaccinated, in the process of getting the vaccine, or have a legitimate medical or religious reason to not be vaccinated by Aug. 23. 

“Folks who have not shared documentation of their vaccination by August 23 will forfeit their SunCommon employment,” the company founders said in their memo to staff working in both Vermont and New York state. 

The step is “to protect our colleagues and their families as well as our customers,” Peterson and Moore said in announcing the new policy. 

“This wasn’t decided lightly. We were able to avoid it for the first 16 months of the global  pandemic. But the wave of dangerous infection brought by the Delta variant has forced this latest step,” they said. 

The current surge across the U.S. - including in Vermont - driven by the highly contagious Delta variant of the virus has “returned us to the dark days of widespread infection, hospitalization and death,” they wrote. 

The company leaders specifically mention the vulnerability of children given that vaccines are only available for individuals age 12 and older. It mentioned the latest COVID-19 outbreak in Waterbury among summer recreation camp children. 

“The remedy to this awful plague is at hand: vaccination. It’s effective, safe, available and  free,” they said, pointing out that the U.S. military, many colleges and universities, and large corporations have begun requiring vaccinations for their workforces citing Apple, Disney, Google, and United Airlines as examples. 

In Vermont the University of Vermont Health Network with six hospitals in Vermont and upstate New York announced last week that as of Oct. 1, it will require its 15,000 employees to be vaccinated for Covid-19 or be tested weekly.   

This week Gov. Phil Scott said that vaccines will be required for state employees working in settings with vulnerable populations including corrections, the state veterans’ long-term care home, and the state’s psychiatric hospital.

A company survey earlier this year found that approximately 94% of SunCommon’s workforce already was vaccinated or intended to get the vaccine, Peterson and Moore pointed out. Those already vaccinated need to show proof of their vaccine to human resources staff, they said. Those not vaccinated may take work time to go get a shot. 

Employees with documented medical conditions that prevent vaccination and those whose religious practices prevent vaccination may be exempted as long as they agree to get tested for COVID weekly and share the results with the company, while continuing to wear a mask and maintain distance from others at work, the policy states. 

The company leaders shared their rationale for the move, saying that they considered workers’ autonomy to make their own decisions about the vaccine. “Yet an employee’s individual rights do not extend to actions that would harm others. We’re in a pandemic, and collective action is necessary to safeguard our people from it,” Peterson and Moore wrote. “Employees deserve a workplace that actively avoids preventable harms. Customers deserve to know they are protected from danger from SunCommon employees.”

They also point out that as a company focused on addressing climate change by providing renewable energy, SunCommon is “a science-based organization - and we adhere to science.”