NYC public school staff will have to receive COVID-19 vaccine by end of September
All New York City public school staff will be required to receive at least one COVID-19 vaccine shot by the last Monday in September, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Monday.
“Today, the New York City Department of Education will be issuing an order requiring all staff in New York City schools to be vaccinated,” de Blasio said during his daily press briefing. “All staff of every kind needs to have at least one dose by Sept. 27.”
“We know this is going to help ensure that everyone is safe,” he added.
The mayor conceded City Hall has not reached a deal with the union representing New York City public school teachers — though vowed to implement the mandate on schedule “if bargaining does not succeed.”
Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers, acknowledged the policy will go through with or without the union’s approval, while cautioning that certain details on it need to be ironed out.
“While the city is asserting its legal authority to establish this mandate, there are many implementation details, including provisions for medical exceptions, that by law must be negotiated with the UFT and other unions, and if necessary, resolved by arbitration,” said Mulgrew in a statement.
The city’s principal’s union was less warm to the regulation.
“While CSA has supported all efforts to encourage vaccination, we have also insisted that vaccination and testing policies are subjects for collective bargaining,” said Mark Cannizzaro, president of Council of School Supervisors & Administrators.
“Today, the mayor acknowledged that the city must negotiate the specifics of the new policy with school-based unions, and we will work to protect our members’ rights and interests at the bargaining table.”
Meanwhile, de Blasio clarified that the vaccine mandate will not apply to public school kids, since it’s crucial for them to be back in classrooms, and said that at-home COVID-19 testing kits will be available for parents and their families.
The latest ramp up of the mayor’s efforts to get more New Yorkers inoculated against the virus amid an uptick in cases due to the Delta variant comes after City Hall rolled out a vaccine or weekly test requirement for the municipal workforce, and a proof of a COVID-19 jab mandate to enter many indoor settings — including Big Apple restaurants, bars, museums and movie theaters.
“This is our passport out of the pandemic,” said Meisha Ross Porter, the city’s schools chancellor. “This vaccine mandate is on top of the multi-layered measures we already have in place, which make our schools some of the safest places to be during COVID.”
The vaccine requirement will apply to all 148,000 Department of Education workers, including people who are employed in the DOE’s central offices and contractors who work in schools, she said.
The chancellor said she does not believe the shot requirement will cause a staffing shortage.
“I expect our staff members to get vaccinated,” she said.
“This is the right policy where it matters most: in our schools,” Dr. Dave Chokshi, the city’s health commissioner, said at the press briefing.
The measure also follows the FDA’s long-awaited approval of Pfizer’s two-dose coronavirus vaccine, as the highly infectious Delta variant of the bug spreads across the country and the five boroughs.
“This is a game-changer,” de Blasio said. “This helps us move forward and we’re moving forward with our schools with this new vaccine mandate.”
The Delta variant, first found in December 2020 in India, has become the dominant strain of the virus in recent months and. It now makes up more than 80 percent of COVID-19 cases, according to city data.
The positivity rate in New York City is now 2.55 percent, according to state data. Meanwhile, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy announced Monday that all of the state’s teachers must either get vaccinated by Oct. 18 or face regular COVID-19 tests — an identical requirement to the one that currently applies to New York City’s municipal workforce.
Murphy said that the state’s 130,000 teachers must either get the shot by Oct. 18 or agree to coronavirus screenings once or twice a week.
“Scientific data shows that vaccination and testing requirements, coupled with strong masking policies, are the best tools for keeping our schools and communities safe for in-person activities,” Murphy said.
While Murphy didn’t give specific figures, he asserted that most of the state’s educators have received the vaccine. New Jersey’s largest teachers union backed the move Monday.
The tri-state area response comes after Gov. Jay Inslee announced last week that all Washington State school staff — public, private and charter — need to be vaccinated by mid-October or face being fired.
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, earlier in the month declared she believes the country’s teachers unions should cooperate with employer-enacted vaccine requirements instead of pushing back against them.
Many local Democratic politicians agree.
Councilman Antonio Reynoso, the likely next Brooklyn borough president, declared that it’s time to lay down the law to get New Yorkers inoculated after months of attempting to lure unvaccinated residents with incentives.
“I think it’s time we start to be a little bit tougher,” he said at the mayor’s Monday press briefing, “showing some New York tough love.”
Additional reporting by Nolan Hicks
