Hey folks,

Sam (Tower Captain: Advent) and I (Tower Captain: Old North) took the time to go through the survey results in order to make an Official Decision about masking during tower bell ringing. (we are not qualified to speak towards masking at handbell ringing on account of it having to adhere to MIT policies)

Firstly, we'd like to thank everyone for your thoughtful and compassionate input. We received 33 survey responses and almost as many comments --I've attached an anonymized summary of the  survey data at the bottom of this email. The brief summary is that ~66% of people prefer a mask-optional policy and ~75% of people prefer the windows to be open when weather permits.

Secondly, we will be changing the policy as follows:

Masks will be optional in the tower when
...the windows are open
...the covid wastewater levels (https://www.mwra.com/biobot/biobotdata.htm) are below 500 "Copies of COVID-19 RNA per milliliter of wastewater"

Additionally, if you are experiencing symptoms of respiratory illness, or have had a recent covid exposure, please wear a mask (or don't attend). This is true even if you have had a negative test --we don't want to spread flus or colds throughout the tower either!

We will give one week's notice if/when masks become required again, and the officers reserve the right to change the policy even if the wastewater number has not reached 500 (eg, if the government re-institutes a state of emergency)

This policy will go into effect starting on Wednesday, July 5th. At that point, masks will be optional but still welcome/encouraged. Please do not harass any ringer for wearing or not-wearing a mask during times when masking is optional.

Thirdly, we had a few comments about getting air filters for the towers. That will not immediately affect the policy, but we think it's a good idea and would like to move forward with figuring out how to do that (including asking the churches for permission to store, finding funds, etc)

Thank you again for your input. A link to the survey data is below:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kzuaXEdywNB-12Q_lekfVpWAMS7PORfQlueYs6x507I/edit?usp=sharing

~Kat and Sam