City of Dreams? More like the City of Disappointment.
Last week, outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasio expanded New York’s vaccine requirements, which were already some of the strictest in the country. The new policy requires all private-sector employers to force their employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19. And all city residents above the age of 5 years old will have to show proof of vaccination to eat inside a restaurant, see a movie, go to the gym, or visit any indoor entertainment venue. Children, specifically, will be barred from many extracurricular school activities, including sports and music programs, if they are not vaccinated.
New Yorkers have until the end of the month to get both vaccine doses. The city’s new mayor, Eric Adams, is set to take office just a few days later.
Adams hasn’t committed to keeping the policy in place, but he hasn’t committed to enforcing it either. He intends to “evaluate this mandate and other COVID strategies when he is in office and make determinations based on science, efficacy, and the advice of health professionals,” Adams’s spokesman, Evan Thies, said in a statement.
For the city’s sake, Adams ought to repeal de Blasio’s mandate immediately. New York business leaders are warning that de Blasio’s employer mandate will drive down tourism and make it even more difficult for business owners to retain employees and turn a profit. Others are concerned that the requirements place a disproportionate burden on children, who are not even at risk of COVID-19 in the first place.
“We know de Blasio is playing a sick game of political posturing in his quixotic run for governor, but to lump kids into the mandate is a new low,” said New York City Council Minority Leader Joe Borelli, vowing to challenge the mandate in court.
But even if New York Republicans succeed in rolling back de Blasio’s restrictions, it is clear that the old New York, the once-great Empire City, is gone. A city that cares about its people, and about bringing more people to it, does not pass policies designed to drive them away. But that’s exactly what’s happening. And it will keep happening for as long as New York’s pandemic insanity continues.
