Scottsdale arts center to require visitors be vaccinated or test negative for COVID-19

PHOENIX – A Valley arts organization will require visitors to be vaccinated or show proof of a negative COVID-19 test before attending an event starting in two weeks.

The Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts will implement the open-ended policy change beginning Oct. 1. Tests results have to be taken within 72 hours before the event or performance, it was announced Wednesday.

Scottsdale Arts President Gerd Wuestemann also said all staff members must be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 before the end of September, citing delta variant concerns.

“We realize that these policies are an inconvenience. But they are necessary to protect touring artists traveling from city to city and performing in front of thousands of people day after after day,” Wuestemann wrote on the arts group’s website.

“Implementing these protocols allows us to once again celebrate the magic of live performances.”

Scottsdale Arts oversees the performing arts center, the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, the city’s arts festival and Canal Convergence activities.

The new protocols for visitors are not in effect at the museum, where timed entries help control crowd size and distancing.

The Arizona Department of Health Services COVID-19 dashboard showed Thursday that 4,104,536 people (57.1% of the state’s population, based on 7,189,020 residents) have received at least one dose of vaccine in Arizona and 3,627,329 people are fully vaccinated (50.5% of the population).

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