Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have worked with our industry leading janitorial company to provide cleanings that exceed CDC guidelines including:

• Disinfecting all common areas following the potential COVID-19 exposures in March. 
• Completing an additional full building disinfection in late June prior to having a full time Alliance Center team staffing presence.
• Continuing routine, full building cleanings at least once per week. This includes supporting our janitorial company and their team early in the pandemic when their other customers completely shut down. 
• Conducting a number of our annual cleanings while the building was lightly used, including thorough waste bin cleaning, conference room white boards and more.

Yes. We are continuing to monitor CDC recommendations as well as our building occupancy to determine what additional services may be appropriate and when. While we have modified some of our evening services in response to a much lower occupancy, we are continually evaluating our cleaning practices to make sure they match the building’s occupancy and usage.

Nightly. Our routine nightly cleaning of the building resumed in late June. Cleaning supplies are available in the event you want to do an extra spot cleaning.

Examples of high-touch surfaces include: door handles, restroom push plates, restroom flush handles, light switches and plates, conference room spaces, stairwell handrails, faucet handles, water fountain push buttons, refrigerator handles, microwave buttons and more.

You are. Our janitorial team cannot touch personal items, so the cleaning and disinfecting of each individual desk is the responsibility of the individual who sits at that desk. Hot desks or completely unoccupied desks will be cleaned by our janitorial team on a regular basis.

Yes. To assist you in disinfecting your desks and shared areas as you feel necessary throughout the day, we have secured enough disinfectant to provide spray bottles on each floor. These will be a shared resource, so please be mindful to wash your hands before and after each use. We also encourage you to consider purchasing personal cleaning materials for individual work surfaces. We suggest individuals and/or organizations purchase an EPA approved disinfectant to clean your personal belongings and work area.

We have removed all reusable towels from our kitchens and replaced them with compostable paper products. This was done in order to reduce cross contamination of surfaces or individuals.

Meetings in the building may continue as long as physical distancing guidelines are followed and gatherings are limited to no more than 25% capacity of the space you are using per the City of Denver’s current restrictions. See the following section for specific information on the maximum recommended occupancy for different spaces in the building and feel free to reach out to events@thealliancecenter.org for any specific event questions. 

Our front doors. Consistent with our operations prior to COVID-19, we request that all visitors and guests enter the building using our Wynkoop Street entrance. We are dedicating this entrance to those individuals and our side entrances from the parking lot to tenants to avoid cross-contamination that is more challenging to trace should an outbreak occur.

Yes. We have provided plexiglass sneeze guards at every desk that faces another individual or an open area such as a receptionist. 

Commonly utilized spaces in the building have the following suggested maximum occupancy:

• Small conference rooms (A and D): 1 person
• Medium conference rooms (B and C): 3 people
• 5th floor large conference room: 7 people
• 3rd floor large conference room: 7 people
• Basement Production Room: 2 people
• We have a dedicated room in the building for isolation purposes. If you should be experiencing symptoms consistent with COVID-19 while at work and are unable to immediately leave The Alliance Center, please contact our staff immediately at 303-572-1536, facilities@thealliancecenter.org, or by visiting the first floor suite for care. 

We have added signage outside each conference room indicating their occupancy thresholds. 

First, the state’s Safer-at-Home phase recommends that businesses allow for flexible work schedules to permit work from home options if they are able to do so and also limits organizations to a reduced (max 25%) staffing capacity when their teams do return to the office to support physical distancing.  

We have shared information with each tenant organization to create appropriate physical distancing (i.e. – 6 feet) at each workspace based on the plans for all suite occupants. This information included coordinating work schedules and utilizing additional areas in the building to support physical distancing like the first floor event space, huddle rooms and conference rooms. 

Based on each tenant organization’s return plans, we will indicate specific desks that should remain unoccupied to support physical distancing in the open floor plan. We will also work to create suite specific plans with our administrative contacts from the organizations occupying the suite so that these plans can be circulated to identify the desks in advance.  

If you would like to reference these floor plans, you can download them here. 

If needed. We have plans in place should the need arise and have removed furniture and chairs from certain areas in the building to serve as overflow space for individuals.

We are requesting that tenants and their visitors enter through the main door and exit through the parking lot doors.

The exterior doors are locked, so you will need your key card to get into The Alliance Center.  Once inside, your keycard will provide access to the exterior doors, stairwells, elevator and your individual suite(s).  The front door will be locked to anyone without a keycard, so you will need to meet your guests at the door.

Yes. We are making several adjustments to support physical distancing. These changes do not apply in the case of an emergency, so please follow The Alliance Center’s emergency exit plan and exit safely.

Entrances

Tenants should use the parking lot door and have any visitors use the main entrance doors.

Stairwells

We have installed signage designating one-way travel in both of our stairwells. The stairwell leading from the first floor lobby is to be used for “up” travel and the stairwell arriving near the mail room will be used for “down”. 

Common Corridors 

We are suggesting that when on the upper floors and basement level everyone walk through those corridors in a counter-clockwise direction.

Elevator

Subject to physical limitations, we encourage the elevator to be used for “up” access only and suggest limiting the number of individuals within the elevator to no more than two people.

Suites

In some suites within the building there are multiple paths of travel. For purposes of establishing a route, we suggest walking to the right when entering a suite.

We ask that occupied interior suite doors to remain open during the workday since they are one of the most highly touched surfaces within the building. At the end of the day if a door is found open, our janitorial team will shut those doors when cleaning. 

Conference room doors should also remain open if not too distracting or the topic of conversation is not of a sensitive nature.

Two. We recommend no more than two individuals in the elevator at a time. 

Yes. The first floor kitchen is accessible to the community. However, we recommend a maximum occupancy of one individual at all times and have removed the catering tables to support physical distancing. 

Kitchenettes on the upper floors are also accessible to the community, and we encourage only one person using it at a time to maintain appropriate physical distancing.

It’s available for nursing mothers only. We understand that this space is beneficial for a multitude of purposes, but as a small space relied upon by nursing mothers, we need to restrict its usage to minimize the risk of contamination. If you are feeling sick, please go home if you can or contact our team while waiting for a ride or other support.

We strongly encourage bike commuting and recognize it is a great way to minimize the risk of exposure from using public transit.  However, given the challenge of thoroughly disinfecting showers after each use, the showers will be closed until further notice.

We will follow all CDC guidelines and close all necessary areas of the building. It is extremely likely that the entire Alliance Center will need to be closed as a result. Any closure will last for a minimum of 48 hours.  Current CDC guidelines advise that potentially contaminated areas be closed off, outside air circulation be increased for 24 hours, followed by a thorough cleaning and disinfecting from a qualified company. Our janitorial team is qualified and ready to perform the cleaning and disinfecting service if needed.

Via email, consistent with all prior communications. We will also notify the community through our texting system if necessary. Please email us at facilities@thealliancecenter.org to confirm that we have your mobile number on file.

Over the course of the last few months, we have incorporated the following to reduce high touch surfaces in the building: 

• Touchless Soap Dispensers – all of the restroom soap dispensers have been replaced with touchless dispensers. Touchless soap dispensers are on order for the kitchen and kitchenettes and other locations where soap is regularly used. 
• Touchless Restroom Door Pulls – all of the restrooms excluding the two ADA restrooms on the first floor now have door pulls at the bottom of the door. You can now use your foot to open these doors as shown in this video. 
• Touchless Front Door Access – the ADA button for our front door has been modified so that it now has a “wave” feature. Simply wave your hand in front of the small screen (approximately 1-2” away) and the doors will automatically open up. If it is outside of our typical business hours, you will first need to swipe your keycard by the keycard reader for this feature to work. 

As always, if you have additional ideas for us to consider please send them to us by emailing us at facilities@thealliancecenter.org.

Events are still occurring in our event space but are limited to no more than 25% capacity of the space you are using per the City of Denver’s current restrictions. See the second question in the “Conference Room and Suites” section for specific information on the maximum recommended occupancy for different spaces in the building and feel free to reach out to events@thealliancecenter.org for any specific event questions. We also provide virtual event consulting services for any events you may be having that have shifted online.

Yes, though under certain new conditions.  Consistent with our Bring Your Dog To Work Policy, a well behaved dog is welcome at The Alliance Center. In addition, to limit high touch surfaces, suite doors must remain open during the day. If your dog will abide by your commands or will be leashed to prevent them from exiting an open suite door, they are welcome.

Not unless absolutely necessary. We understand that childcare realities may limit this option, but we strongly encourage children to remain at home. They are able to come into the building if it is absolutely necessary for them to be properly cared for. We ask that children wear a mask (like everyone else) and stay with their parent or guardian at all times.

The Alliance Center has focused on air quality for your health and productivity since our 2014 renovation. Many of our approaches already in place are helpful in reducing the spread of COVID-19. Specific approaches include: 

• Maximizing fresh air- Our HVAC system includes an “economizer” setting to maximize outdoor air whenever possible. We also “flush out” the building overnight as much as possible to remove stagnant inside air with fresh outdoor air. 
• High filtration levels- We use MERV 13 air filters, which are some of the highest rated filters that are available and used in commercial buildings. 
• Air quality monitoring- The Alliance Center is constantly monitoring the building’s carbon dioxide levels and adjusting the amount of fresh air accordingly. We also monitor carbon dioxide levels in a few of our larger shared spaces like the fifth floor conference room. In addition to watching these levels, we also evaluate other air quality levels annually since 2015. These air quality tests have shown that the carbon dioxide and total volatile organic compounds levels in our facility vastly exceed regional and global ratings for air quality. We recently invested in handheld monitors and will use them to continue to regularly collect air quality data.  

While each of these elements above will continue, due to the wide majority of our community continuing to work from home, we have elected to reduce the level of heating permitted in the building. This may mean cooler temperatures than expected and we encourage you to plan accordingly.

Water sitting in pipes in an unoccupied building can cause problems, so we have run the water in all of our bathrooms, kitchens, water fountains and all other water fixtures a couple times a week throughout the stay at home period. This meets the recommendations provided by the CDC and Denver Water for ensuring high water quality when the building begins to be reoccupied.

In June we completed a thorough water quality test of our facility to validate acceptable levels of nitrates, nitrites, total coliforms, legionella, copper and lead. All of those testing results met the standards in place by the EPA.

Yes. You can continue to utilize the plates and utensils for the community. Please wash before and after using them to minimize the risk of any contamination.

You may continue to park in spots marked as “Guest” in our parking lot. Please look at the signage carefully to ensure you occupy a parking space that is not reserved. You must still pay for parking and can find details regarding our payment platform here.

Yes. In late summer we installed additional bicycle racks on the 2nd through 5th Floor in the elevator lobbies. Each rack will support two bicycles and as is seen elsewhere is on a first-come/first-served basis. Currently we have not provided a means to lock a bicycle to these racks, but will explore the need once the building is more regularly occupied.

No. We request that all food deliveries be accepted by our tenants either in the lobby or outside of the building. We will not provide access to areas outside of the first floor for the delivery of food.

No. Since all of the lights in the building are controlled by either a predetermined schedule or are motion activated, we request you not override our controls unless necessary. Let us know if you notice any issues with lights staying on or going off when they shouldn’t be. Contact us by emailing facilities@thealliancecenter.org.

We are in frequent contact with the Serendipity Cafe to reopen as soon as building occupancy reaches a level that supports their business reopening to tenants and the public.