Keeping Your Strata Community Healthy During The Coronavirus (Covid-19) Pandemic

With society retreating back into the home, the role of strata communities has never been more important.

The coronavirus stands to impact strata communities in a number of significant ways, and the team at Ace have put our minds together to prepare a guide for managing this health crisis in your communities.

Being reactive has never been best practice for strata communities, so we are urging decision makers in strata communities to be proactive and set some strong benchmarks for health and safety before things get worse.

Ace has over 130 body corporate franchises nationwide, managing over 65,000 lots and we’ve pulled some insights from our national team to help make your community safer.

So, is 2020 the time to invest in strata property? Here’s what the experts are saying about the Australian property market in 2020.

Below are some areas of focus for your community in responding to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Making a Healthier Community

Education

Strata committees can be leading from the front on coronavirus education, and rolling out posters and fact sheets throughout their communities.

Residents already look to strata schemes for guidance on safer living, so we’re recommending schemes take initiative and be a mouthpiece for the relevant health authorities.

No need to reinvent the wheel, just simply print off and sign/distribute the health and hygiene information already prepared by State and Federal Health authorities.

Here is a collection of sites that may be helpful for your community in finding the relevant resources.

• ACT
• NSW
• NT
• QLD
• SA
• TAS
• VIC
• WA

Cleaning

According to the World Health Organization, it is not certain how long the virus survives on surfaces, but studies suggest that coronaviruses may persist on surfaces for a few hours or up to several days.

This places the onus on strata committees already responsible for cleaning common areas to improve community health by expanding cleaning measures.

These measures could include ensuring all common area surfaces are wiped clean with disinfectant on a regular schedule. This could simply mean ensuring tables and chairs in common areas are wiped down. However, on the more comprehensive end of the scale, this could mean ensuring ‘high touch’ areas like elevator button displays, car park and building entry doors and handles are part of cleaning protocols.

Additionally, cleaning before and after body corporate meetings will become an important task.

In the event that meetings are held on community property, ensuring that these facilities and any tea and coffee-making facilities used at these meetings are clean will only improve community health.

Virtual > Face to Face meetings

With the focus firmly on avoiding large groupings of people, in favour of self-isolating, strata communities may need to rethink community meetings in the short term.

To ensure important decisions can still be made, some simple solutions may be

• Making meetings accessible via video & teleconferencing
• Send an email to your body corporate manager outlining your priority issues for discussion
• Appoint a representative as the meeting proxy
• Postpone the meeting

If you’ve got meetings scheduled in the coming weeks and months that can be held via video and teleconferencing, Ace’s strata managers are here to assist and provide guidance on how to set this up.

Still need advice?

If you wish to discuss any strata community coronavirus concerns further with an Ace Body Corporate manager, please do not hesitate to contact us via our website or undertake your own research on this matter. Please use the links above in the Education section to access up to date health authority information.