Senators Announce Temporary Layoffs, Employee Furloughs During COVID-19 Pandemic

The Ottawa Senators announced Thursday that the team's "full-time workforce will be reduced" temporarily and that the hours of "some of the staff will be furloughed," per Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Sun: 

The Senators will be instituting an unemployment plan that will "supplement employment insurance benefits" through July 3 "up to a minimum of 80 percent base salary." 

Ottawa isn't the only NHL team to lay off workers during the league's hiatus because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Per Garrioch, the Edmonton Oilers, Calgary Flames and Montreal Canadiens have also reduced staff. 

The looming question that remains is when, and if, the NHL season will resume. According to a Canadian government document obtained by Christopher Nardt of the National Post, "Current GoC [Government Operations Centre] modelling suggests as a best case scenario that current measures continue until at least July."

And Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the timeline for Canadian life returning back to normal remains unclear, per Nardt:

"There are obviously many, many different projections of how long this could last, how serious this could be, how many cases we could be facing. But those projections all hinge on choices that Canadians are making today, choices they made over the past few days, choices they will be making over the coming few days. We will be able to say more about how many weeks or months this lasts for as we see the impacts of the behaviours people have engaged in over these days."

Most events at the Canadian Tire Centre have been either postponed or canceled outright for the next several months during the coronavirus pandemic, per Garrioch.