The pandemic and its recovery have created unprecedented opportunities for SMACNA contractors, raising our industry’s visibility among building owners, operators, and general contractors. There has never been a time where the critical role played by SMACNA contractors is center stage in national and global discussions about optimizing indoor airflow to help reduce or prevent the transmission of disease, pollutants, or even CO2 buildup in classrooms.
At the recent White House Summit on Indoor Air Quality, Dr. Ashish Jha, COVID-19 Response Coordinator, stated, “We must Bring the burden of respiratory pathogens down. And the single biggest structural change we can make as a society is to do what we have done for indoor air for water quality. Whether it is in schools or businesses or other public places, if you are somebody who runs a building operates a building, it is incumbent on you to make sure that the place you run, the place you own, does not become a place that unnecessarily spreads viruses, gets people sick, fills up our hospitals, causes unnecessary suffering and death. We need healthy buildings because we need healthy communities.”
SMACNA is responding by developing a comprehensive Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) campaign. This initiative will heighten awareness and change the perception of indoor air quality among building owners and building operators to a point where providing the best indoor air quality becomes top of mind.
The campaign will focus on three critical areas.
- A primary objective of the campaign will be to inform and educate key stakeholders about the need for improved IAQ, as well as the full scope of the problem and risks involved with providing sub-standard indoor air quality to occupants, whether they be students, employees, or tenants.
- In addition to educating visitors, the site will serve the dual purpose of providing information on the hundreds of billions of dollars in funding programs offered to schools and businesses to improve air quality in indoor spaces.
- And finally, we will showcase the work of our member contractors through case studies. SMACNA will also provide an enhanced directory and search function, enabling visitors to connect directly to highly skilled SMACNA contractors in their areas.
It is highly important that you log in to SMACNA’s website and update your company profile to ensure all your public-facing information is current and accurate. This includes a main phone line, email contact, website address, and social media channels (if available).
SMACNA is currently at the beginning stages of development and production. We are researching critical influencers in the indoor air quality space with whom we would like to collaborate and use on this initiative. If you know of any industrial hygienists or medical practitioners that would be great spokespeople, please let us know). Several chapter executives and NEMI have been very helpful in making connections and sharing research content as reference material.
SMACNA is looking to launch this website and social media campaign sometime in March/April. Contact Jeff Henriksen, Executive Director of Communications & Marketing, for more information or to share ideas.
