The mayor of a city in South Carolina explained in “Fox & Friends” on Wednesday what prompted him to call a local Chick-fil-A manager when a drive-thru COVID-19 vaccination site was closed last week, saying the manager helped provide “a retail mindset.”
Mount Pleasant Mayor Will Haynie said Chick-fil-A manager Jerry Walkowiak was able to reduce the waiting time from one hour to 15 minutes after problems arising from a computer failure.
“It was Jerry helping his community when it mattered most,” Haynie told host Steve Doocy.
On Friday, the computer crash caused a backup of traffic at a vaccine clinic in Mount Pleasant, leaving people stranded for up to an hour, Haynie explained. He said he then contacted Walkowiak due to his experience in drive-thru and requested reinforcements to help with the reorganization.
“Early on, the record dropped,” explained Haynie on Wednesday, noting that he doesn’t know what happened.
He noted that the Medical University of South Carolina collaborated with two local hospitals for the vaccination campaign, which was carried out on the “huge campus” of a Mount Pleasant church located across the street where Chick-fil-A Walkowiak administers. Haynie said more than 1,000 people signed up to receive the vaccine that day.
“Early on, something happened and was backed up and I planned to call Jerry anyway, just for general advice, but when that happened, I needed him very quickly,” said Haynie.
“Jerry came and fixed us,” he added.
Haynie tweeted a video on Walkowiak Friday directing traffic while he was in the rain with an umbrella and wrote: “Chic Fil A manager Jerry Walkowiak, donating his professional experience to help our Mt Pleasant vaccination program today.”
“When you need help, call the professionals,” he wrote.
The good deed footage went viral, accumulating more than 33,000 views since it hit the Internet on January 22.
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“What Jerry did was help us move from a medical-type mentality, where you pull and talk to a person, to a retail mentality, where you figure out how to get as many cars through the first entrance as possible,” Haynie explained, adding that the waiting time went from one hour to about 15 minutes.
When contacted for comment, a spokesman for Chick-fil-A Inc. told Fox News that the vaccination site was across the street from the restaurant.
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As of Wednesday morning, South Carolina had reported more than 423,600 cases of coronavirus among residents, with nearly 6,600 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Janine Puhak of Fox News contributed to this report.