After Hours Access Resuming

July 26, 2021

Dear Members,

This week, the health officers of 8 counties in Washington including King County put out a joint statement stating the need for masks in indoor public spaces where they do not identify the vaccination status of those in that space*. You can read that joint statement <here>. We have had our wristband vaccination identification program in place for over a month now at BHC, and it has been incredibly successful. We have an average vaccination rate of over 95%, and our members can have peace of mind seeing those around them who aren’t wearing masks are vaccinated. I’d like to once again thank our members for their incredible cooperation, and our staff for administering our wristband program and helping to make BHC by far the safest health club in Ballard.

On Monday, August 9th  we will officially restart our 24 hours a day, 7 day a week access to the Club that was stopped back in March 2020 because of COVID. To get into the Club outside of front desk hours through our after hours access door, you will need to have a new yellow RFID key fob. Our Basic gym membership does not include 24/7 access, but our PLUS membership does. If you have a PLUS membership, you may purchase a yellow key fob for a technology charge of $10 at the front desk. If you have an old blue RFID key fob and are a PLUS member, you may exchange that for a yellow key fob at no charge. If you have a Basic membership and have a blue key fob from the past, you may bring it to the front desk and request a $10 refund. Thank you to Jake Burkey, our Facility Manager, for putting together a new overnight crew to enable our 24/7 offering.

With some of our day staff going back to school and assigning more responsibility to others, you will be seeing some more new faces in our BHC staff family over the coming month. 

In the coming month, we will be working toward preparing spaces for more in-studio classes. During COVID, when we were not allowed to have in-studio classes, we made the most of the studios for extended workout space. We now have a plan to rearrange equipment and some areas of the gym to allow more in-studio classes and make more efficient use of the gym space we have.

I know that all the recent news of increased COVID cases is discouraging, but the good news is that vaccinations have proven to be very successful, and we live in a part of the country that realizes that.

*Since writing this letter, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended that fully vaccinated people in areas of the country with “substantial or high transmission” of COVID wear masks indoors again due to the Delta variant. King County is currently in a “substantial transmission” area and it is recommended to wear masks indoors once more.

Sincerely, 

Pat Gilbrough
Owner, General Manager
pat@ballardhealthclub.com