This story has been edited to clarify that two of the seven unvaccinated employees received exemptions for human rights reasons.
The District of North Vancouver says “less than a handful” of its staff have been put on unpaid leave for failing to comply with the district’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate.
Chief administrative officer Dave Stuart said only five of the 500-plus employees subject to the mandate have not complied by the Jan. 14 deadline, and two were granted an exemption for human rights reasons.
With numbers that low, Stuart said there has been no need for the district to use contingency plans to deal with disruptions from staff turnover.
“It’s very, very good,” he said. “It's strictly a matter of safety.”
That total doesn’t include the North Vancouver District Library, which has its own mandate effective at the end of the week. North Vancouver Recreation and Culture staff must have their shots by March 31.
Before the municipal mandate was issued, the district did a survey of employees and found a high level of support for making two doses a prerequisite for coming into work.
Inside municipal hall, in-person meetings with staff have been restricted to one-on-one, and only if both parties have been vaccinated, Stuart said.
“I took the position, if we're going to do that with the public, we have to do it with staff,” Stuart said. “Treating them both, I think, as fairly as we can to get over this particular wave.”
And the district has reworked its human resources plans to rotate which staff members are physically in the office at a given time to reduce the risk of an outbreak.
“We have had no COVID cases that are as a result of workplace exposure. All the exposures of COVID cases have come from outside, so we're very confident and comfortable that the approach that we've taken is not only supported by staff, but provides the maximum safety for staff and of course, any member of the public that is coming into the hall,” Stewart said.
Although there have been more cases of COVID-19 in the Omicron wave than there were previously, Stewart said it’s very unlikely anyone would notice an impact on the delivery of services.
“Quite frankly, we haven't had a lot of disruption,” he said.
City of North Vancouver workers, meanwhile, must be fully vaccinated by Jan. 25.
When the District of West Vancouver's mandate came into force on Jan. 4, 17 staffers (or 1.68 per cent of the workforce) were put on leave, while just one of the West Vancouver Police Department's 90 officer and civilian staff failed to show proof of vaccination by their Jan. 11 deadline.
