The Los Angeles City Council Tuesday approved the city’s Covid-19 employee vaccination mandate, which includes an enforcement framework that could lead to the termination of workers who fail to obtain medical or religious exemptions and who remain unvaccinated by mid-December. Eric Leonard reports for the NBC4 News on Tuesday, Oct. 26, 2021.
The Los Angeles City Council Tuesday approved the city's Covid-19 employee vaccination mandate, which includes an enforcement framework that could lead to the termination of workers who fail to obtain medical or religious exemptions and who remain unvaccinated by mid-December.
NBC4's I-Team also obtained copies of the exemption forms provided to employees this week, which ask for documentation of religious beliefs or medical conditions which conflict with the city policy or vaccinations in general.
The religious form says employee beliefs must be more than personal preferences based on social, political, or economic philosophies.
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It asks for employees to describe how long they've had the beliefs, how the beliefs govern other parts of their lives, and to provide religious articles or texts that describe why the observance "conflicts" with the city's vaccination requirements.
It also asks employees about other vaccinations they've received as adult, and both forms caution that false statements could be grounds for discipline.
The council approved the plan without public discussion.
The rules now require unvaccinated employees in the process of seeking exemptions to be tested for Covid-19 twice weekly, at the employees' own expense, and on the employees' own time.
Workers whose exemptions are approved will be reimbursed for the cost of the testing.
City data released last week showed thousands of employees planned to seek exemptions, including more than 2,100 LAPD employees, far more than at any other City department.
