NEW YORK — Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration has been temporarily blocked from enforcing a vaccine mandate for nearly all adults in New York City public school buildings, after a federal appeals court granted a temporary injunction Friday.
The mandate, which affects well over 150,000 people working in the nation’s largest school system, was set to go into effect at midnight Monday. Educators, parents and union officials have been bracing for the likelihood of staffing shortages and disruption in at least some schools where significant numbers of educators and staff members are not vaccinated.
A judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit granted the injunction on a temporary basis and referred the case to a panel of three judges for review. It is not clear if the issue will be resolved before the Monday deadline.
Last week, a state Supreme Court judge ruled that the city could move forward with the mandate, after considering a separate but similar lawsuit filed by a coalition of unions that represents employees in public schools. The judge, Laurence Love, said state and federal courts have consistently upheld mandatory vaccination orders.
And Thursday, a federal judge in Brooklyn, Brian M. Cogan, declined to grant the injunction sought by a group of teachers, calling the mandate “a rational policy decision surrounding how best to protect children during a global pandemic.” The teachers then appealed, successfully, to the Court of Appeals.
Leaders of the unions representing the city’s teachers and principals have called on de Blasio to delay the implementation of the mandate, arguing that schools are not prepared to deal with staffing crunches.
The mandate, which was announced last month, requires all educators, along with staff like custodians, school lunch helpers and safety agents, to receive at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine by Monday night. It is the first vaccine mandate without a test-out option for any group of city workers.
“We’re confident our vaccine mandate will continue to be upheld once all the facts have been presented, because that is the level of protection our students and staff deserve,” a spokesperson for the Department of Education, Danielle Filson, said in a statement.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times .