The Sea Pines Resort has confirmed a furlough that impacts a majority of its workforce. Steve Birdwell, President of The Sea Pines Resort, said that “We want to do everything possible to limit the spread of the coronavirus and protect our employees, residents, and the Sea Pines community. We have met with employees who are impacted by the furlough.”

Birdwell emphasized that The Sea Pines Resort will be paying the impacted employees through April 11 and that their health insurance through The Sea Pines Resort will remain active.  He added “It is important to note that we have relaxed our paid time off (PTO) policy to allow employees to take all of the PTO hours they have accrued and any hours they would have accrued through the full year in 2020. Again, this is paying employees for any PTO that they would have available this year as well as any PTO they carried over from last year. An employee’s PTO depends upon their years of service.” He reiterated that “the PTO hours are available to the impacted employees. It’s their choice whether or not to use their PTO hours.”

Birdwell stated “The furloughs were effective April 1 and the resort could open as soon as early May (which means the furloughs would last approximately one month) but it all depends upon the evolving COVID-19 situation. The furloughs were throughout the Resort and they include a majority of our workforce.

“Our primary concern has been the health and well-being of our team members, guests, residents and the Sea Pines community. These furloughs included more than our hospitality staff. We have suspended a lot of our operations in order to help mitigate and reduce the spread of the virus.

“The employee furlough was not our first course of action during these challenging times. Over the past several weeks we have taken many proactive steps to be responsible and keep resort operations running as safely and smoothly as possible. Prior to the furlough, we undertook extensive cost-saving initiatives, deferred spending, and scaled back our resort operations to only essential services with limited operating hours and staff members. In addition, we have had employees working remotely where possible.

“We look forward to the day we can welcome all of our team members back to work and return our resort to full operation,” Birdwell said.