The city's HR director says the 'goal is really not to discipline employees'
After a two-week extension, today is the deadline for San Jose employees to comply with the city’s COVID-19 booster mandate.
The original deadline was Feb. 11, but about 800 workers failed to comply in time. As of Feb. 17, 82% of the city’s more than 6,000 actively working and booster-eligible employees had submitted proof of a booster shot, according to data from San Jose’s Office of Employee Relations. To increase that percentage, the city established more booster clinic options over the past two weeks. Meanwhile, 95% of the city’s workforce is fully vaccinated, data shows.
“Our goal is really not to discipline employees,” San Jose HR Director Jennifer Schembri told The Mercury News. “Our goal is to get people boosted, and to the extent that we can give additional time to get more people into compliance, that is what we want to do.”
Ahead of the initial deadline, roughly 50 city employees received approved or pending religious or medical exemptions for the booster mandate. Those who refuse to get boosted and aren’t granted exemptions can continue working, city officials say, as long as they agree to testing twice a week and are willing to face up to 40 hours of unpaid leave.
Councilmember and mayoral candidate Raul Peralez has proposed that San Jose ditch the mandate in favor of requiring that any employee who doesn’t submit proof of a booster shot be tested twice a week. The threat of...
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