The City of Philadelphia is pushing back its vaccine deadline for city workers by a further 10 days.
The city announced in November of last year that workers, including those in a union, could face termination if they were not fully vaccinated or had a medical or religious exemption by Jan. 14. However, the city on Friday cited legally mandated negotiations with unions as reason for pushing back the date to Jan. 24.
“Due to this and based on pending agreements and discussions with the City’s unions, the vaccine mandate deadline for employees has been adjusted to Monday, January 24, 2022,” Mayor Jim Kenney’s office said in a press release.
Additionally, the mayor’s office indicated, the Jan. 24 deadline could still be “subject to future adjustment” as “interest arbitration proceedings continue for certain uniformed employees.”
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In a written statement, Kenney said nearly 22,000 city workers have been fully vaccinated and at least another 1,300 have received exemptions. Those numbers represent nearly 81% of city employees, Kenney said.
The city published vaccination rates of city workers by department to its website. The figures show the departments with the least vaccinated workers are the police, fire and streets departments, which all had employee vaccination rates between 61% and 70% as of Tuesday, Jan. 11.
