Workers in the New York City schools system have until the end of this week to receive their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Those who don’t face being placed on unpaid leave, Mayor Bill de Blasio said on Tuesday.
The mayor issued the new mandate Monday evening after a three-judge panel in the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals withdrew a temporary injunction it approved Friday. That was in place while the court reviewed a federal district court’s decision not to throw out the city’s vaccination mandate for Department of Education workers.
“For anyone who has not gotten a dose by Friday at 5 p.m., after all the encouragement, all the support, all the incentives, we’re going to then assume you’re not coming to work Monday morning as a vaccinated employee, and we will immediately find a substitute,” the mayor said. “And then those folks will go on leave without pay, who chose not to get vaccinated.”
Those who do not get vaccinated nor received an exemption will go on unpaid leave effective Monday. Those individuals would maintain their position and continue to receive health insurance coverage through September 2022.
On July 26, the city ordered all 148,000 Department of Education employees and department contractors working in school-based settings to begin the vaccination process by Sept. 13. The mandate also applied to any visitor age 12 or older to a school or department facility.
At that time, the order gave affected individuals an opt-out through weekly testing.
However, on Aug. 23, de Blasio rescinded the testing option, saying that advice from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended full vaccinations for education workers. He then extended the first dose deadline to Monday.
That led Rachel Maniscalco, a Staten Island public school teacher, to file a lawsuit on Sept. 10. According to her complaint, the city informed the United Federation of Teachers that anyone with a medical issue, such as an allergic reaction to a vaccine component, would be allowed to take paid medical leave. They would then switch to unpaid leave after that expires.
Those with religious exceptions would immediately be placed on unpaid leave.
“The public needs to have any qualified teachers who are available to teach in the public schools – as those teachers very often were in the last year when there was no vaccine, and transmission rates were much higher than they are now,” the complaint stated. “With alternative proper safety procedures, transmission rates can be kept low while all teachers can fulfill their profession and teach students, advancing the public interest.”
After being denied a temporary restraining order in federal district court, Maniscalco, who was joined by three others in the suit, took the case to the appeals court.
In its response to the plaintiffs’ appeal, the city noted a distinct difference between mandating teachers get vaccinated while allowing first responders like firefighters and police officers to test weekly.
“Unlike those other City employees, teachers and paraprofessionals spend long periods of time with children indoors, while many of those children remain ineligible for vaccination,” the city’s response stated. “The vaccination mandate is not just a rational public health measure, but a crucial one.”
De Blasio said Tuesday that about 1,000 education employees got vaccinations on Monday. With that, 91 percent of teachers and 87 percent of all department employees have had at least one dose.
The mayor also added those who go on unpaid leave starting Monday will be allowed to return if they get a shot. It would be “a very prolonged period” before anyone would be fired.
“There is definitely a chance to correct for people who think better of the situation,” de Blasio said. “Miss their paycheck, miss their opportunity to serve people, miss their colleagues, whatever it is, they can correct.”
