Mayor Bill de Blasio is absolutely right to order all city Department of Education employees to get at least one jab by Sept. 27: His public-health powers plainly allow it, and it’s vital to keeping the public schools open and functioning.
It’s also a moral imperative: New York’s kids have already lost far too much ground to the farce of remote learning. A full and successful reopening is needed not just so children can start learning again and parents can return to work, but to save public education itself.
And no, Blas’ earlier requirement of jabs-or-weekly-testing isn’t enough: That’s far too likely to lead to a few teachers, janitors or lunch aides testing positive and prompting parental panic and perhaps a school shutdown.
Nor is this remotely the same as requiring “vaccine passports” to enter a restaurant: It’s not about shaming or bullying the vax-resistant over eating out for an hour or two in an establishment where everyone enters willingly. It’s about ensuring confidence that schools — where attendance for hours on end is mandatory — are safe and able to function reliably.
The mayor should get no flak from the United Federation of Teachers: Its former head and now national chief, Randi Weingarten, has called for just such school-vax mandates (as has the other national teachers union, the National Education Association).
After its demands for safety guarantees in the face of COVID, the UFT would destroy what’s left of its reputation if it tried to protect members who claim a right to put other teachers (and kids!) at risk.
Yes, other city unions have filed a grievance, claiming the issue is subject to collective bargaining — but notice that there’s zero talk of strikes. And de Blasio surely got legal advice before making the move: Now that the Food and Drug Administration’s finally granted full OK to the Pfizer shot, the city Health Department’s powers should suffice.
Much as the unions may pretend otherwise, not everything’s subject to negotiation. Even in New York, labor law is not a suicide pact.
