Nashville Standard

Kendrick Murphy was new to the workforce when he was hired by Premier Parking as a flagger.

Now the Shelby-area man has been laid off for the first time, not because of anything he did but because COVID-19 has dried up the business the company he worked for depended upon.

Murphy isn't taking it well. 

Kendrick Murphy

"I'm really upset about it," he told the Nashville Standard. "I need money to keep a living, to keep paying my bills, to enjoy life, help my mother."

Murphy wants his job at Premier Parking back.

"There are lots of things I could be doing but I love the job, all the people who work there and all the nice people I've met," he said.

Murphy said he feels conflicted about the entire crisis and what he should expect.

"I don't want to depend on the government," he said. "I haven't been working long but I felt like I could really make a living with Premier Parking. Hopefully, I can get back to work when everything gets better."

How the coronavirus caused his layoff a few weeks ago is still difficult for Murphy to fathom.

"This is ridiculous" he said. "Like, how do they expect us to live?"

Premier Parking officials are wondering much the same, about Murphy, about the many other employees the company was forced to furlough last month and about how the company itself will survive.

Last week Premier Parking COO William Clay called for more help to start flowing to his industry that has been hard hit by the economic freefall wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The phase III stimulus package, which included extended unemployment benefits, passed by the U.S. House and Senate last month, likely will help most of Premier Parking's furloughed employees, including Murphy, but the company also is struggling, Clay said.

"We are asking that the parking industry [NAICS 812930] be recognized as an industry in need of assistance, and we are asking for business interruption insurance to be granted to our company [and others like us] in this time of great need," Clay told Tennessee Business Daily.

Premier Parking employs more than 2,000 associates in more than 600 locations in more than 40 cities across the nation, providing services at concerts, sports and other events.

Those events are postponed or canceled, drying up Premier Parking's business as the company's customers are largely stuck at home waiting out the crisis. That led to the furlough of hundreds of Premier Parking's employees.

"[The coronavirus] has caused devastation to our company and to our family of employees as we've been forced to lay off hundreds of employees over the past two weeks," Clay said. "This has been the most difficult two weeks of my professional life. Revenues are down 90-plus percent across the board as most CBDs are shelter-in-place and employees are working from home."

The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was starkly illustrated earlier last week when the U.S. Labor Department reported that a record-breaking 6.6 million workers signed up last week for unemployment benefits.

The majority of Premier Parking's workforce are in field operations, including valet drivers at hotels, also shut down by the crisis, and shuttle bus drivers for hotel employees who also have been largely furloughed.

"Through no fault of their own, their lives have been turned upside down, Clay said. "They lost a steady job with a reliable paycheck and are facing repercussions that may seem insurmountable for many."