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SAN FRANCISCO, California, June 29, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) – One of the most liberal cities in the United States is facing accusations of racism after city officials announced that all government workers must receive coronavirus vaccines.
“San Francisco will require all 35,000 city employees to be vaccinated against the coronavirus once a vaccine receives full approval from the Food and Drug Administration,” the San Francisco Chronicle reported. “The new policy makes San Francisco the first city or county in California – and probably the U.S. – to mandate COVID vaccinations for all government employees.”
People who refuse and are not granted an exemption could be fired. The vaccines for the Wuhan coronavirus have only been granted Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
The Black Employees Alliance (BEA) wrote to Mayor London Breed and said the new mandate is “quite disturbing.” Only 58 percent of black residents in the California city have received at least one dose of the vaccine, according to the city’s vaccine dashboard.
The Alliance took issue with “a government entity requiring employees to undergo medical procedures that would force them to either take the vaccination, release private medical information to be exempted from receiving the vaccine, or be fired from their jobs,” according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
The requirement to take the COVID-19 jab is “harsh, insensitive, and is anticipated to have disproportionate impacts to the city’s Black employees,” according to the BEA and the Coalition Against Anti-Blackness.
Unions that represent city employees have also criticized the new policy.
SEIU Local 1021 told the local San Francisco paper that “the new policy overlooks the cultural, religious and health factors that have deterred certain workers from getting the vaccine.” Unions representing firefighters and skilled trades also voiced opposition.
Tolerance for culture differences has not stopped a liberal state senator from pushing for the city mandate.
“The pandemic isn’t over. The only way we beat it is for *everyone* to get vaccinated,” Democrat Scott Wiener wrote on Twitter along with a warning about the “Delta variant” and what he called a “Delta Plus” variant.
“No more excuses. People just need to do it. I support SF’s vaccine mandate for public workers,” Wiener wrote. “We need more of that thinking.”
All city employees must “report their vaccination status to the City no later than July 29, 2021, and if they are fully vaccinated, to provide documentation to verify that status,” the policy said.
Government workers must “be fully vaccinated and report that vaccination status to the City no later than 10 weeks after the Federal Food & Drug Administration (FDA) gives final approval to at least one COVID-19 vaccine.”
“All employees must provide the name of vaccine, date(s) of vaccination, and upload documentation into the system,” the city ordered.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has said that “employers that have a vaccine requirement may need to respond to allegations that the requirement has a disparate impact on—or disproportionately excludes—employees based on their race, color, religion, sex, or national origin under Title VII.”
In May 2021, the median price of a house in San Francisco was $1.4 million, according to housing website Redfin. In recent years the once-beautiful yet ultra-liberal, pro-gay city has been plagued by rising rates of homelessness and drug use. The problem of human feces on streets became so prevalent in 2018 that a San Francisco resident created a free app for people to report human waste sightings.
“San Francisco is known for its filthy streets; the 311 line receives about 65 calls regarding sidewalk poop every day. To address the issue, the Department of Public Works announced in April it hired five staffers to join a ‘Poop Patrol’ to steam clean sidewalks and clean up feces,” the San Francisco Chronicle reported at the time.
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