City Council
Report
City Council Meeting: February 8, 2022
Agenda Item: 4.A
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To: Mayor and City Council
From: David White, City Manager, City Manager's Office
Subject: Study Session on Mandating Proof of COVID-19 Vaccination at Local Businesses and City Facilities
Recommended Action
Staff recommends that the City Council review and comment on the Study Session on Mandating Proof of COVID-19 Vaccination at Local Businesses and City Facilities and the strategy outlined by the COVID-19 Emergency Operations Center.
Executive Summary
The City of Santa Monica’s COVID-19 Emergency Operations Center (EOC) has managed the City’s internal and community-facing COVID-19 response operations since March 2020. The EOC has many responsibilities, including serving as a liaison to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (DPH), overseeing a team of Health Ambassadors to educate on and enforce County COVID-19 requirements within Santa Monica, hosting COVID-19 vaccination and testing sites, and supporting a safe workplace in City facilities by administering staff contact tracing, ensuring distribution of personal protection equipment, regular communications with City departments, and other activities.
Per City Council direction on January 11, 2022, the City’s Emergency Operations Center team has been asked to assess whether current conditions warrant consideration of an indoor vaccination mandate for Santa Monica businesses to improve community health. This Study Session provides findings and presents recommendations moving forward.
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Background
LA County DPH is the public health authority for almost all cities and unincorporated areas within the County of Los Angeles, including the City of Santa Monica. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the City of Santa Monica has closely followed and aligned DPH’s Health Officer Orders.
Currently, the County of Los Angeles Health Officer Order has maintained augmented risk reduction measures for specific business sectors. On November 3, 2021, DPH implemented a requirement that patrons of all bars, breweries, wineries, distilleries, nightclubs, and lounges provide proof of full vaccination against COVID-19 for entry into the facility to obtain indoor service. LA County DPH has also required full vaccination or proof of negative COVID-19 viral test result for entry at indoor and outdoor mega events. Restaurants and other businesses may voluntarily implement indoor vaccination requirements for its staff and patrons and LA County recommends this for restaurant establishments due to increased risk of transmission where people are indoors and unmasked. All Santa Monica businesses are required to comply with the local Health Officer Order.
In Fall 2021, three jurisdictions within Los Angeles County implemented additional vaccination requirements in expanded sectors, including all food/beverage establishments, gyms/fitness venues, entertainment/recreation venues, personal care establishments and City facilities. The City of Los Angeles and the City of West Hollywood fully implemented this requirement on November 4, 2021, with the City of Culver City following on November 29, 2021. These actions preceded COVID-19 Omicron variant community transmission and subsequent case surge that now appears to be subsiding.
In December 2021, the Omicron variant rapidly became the dominant COVID-19 variant in Los Angeles County. Unlike previous COVID-19 variants, the highly contagious Omicron variant has an increased ability to infect fully vaccinated persons and transmit between vaccinated persons, especially in environments where additional risk mitigation 3 of 9
measures, like masking, are not utilized. While it has been shown that the COVID-19 vaccination booster provides the best protection against Omicron variant infection and hospitalization, no guiding health agency has changed the definition of “fully vaccinated” to include the booster dose.
As Omicron has increased in transmission in LA County, the difference in case rate ratios between unvaccinated and vaccinated groups has significantly decreased. Based on LA County data from December 25, 2021, unvaccinated persons have a 1.6 times higher chance to contract COVID-19 compared to fully vaccinated persons without a booster dose, but a 3.8 times higher chance to contract COVID-19 compared to persons who are fully vaccinated and have received the booster. Both fully vaccinated persons and those with booster shots have a much lower chance of being hospitalized due to a COVID-19 infection compared to unvaccinated persons.
In response to Omicron variant cases, LA County Department of Public Health changed its Health Officer Order to require all employees wear medical-grade masks when working indoors and also changed its quarantine requirements, no longer allowing an exemption for persons who are fully vaccinated. However, no sectors have been newly included in the region’s indoor business vaccination mandate. 4 of 9
As of February 1, 2022, LA County COVID-19 data metrics are showing rapid and sustained decline, including daily cases, daily case rate, positivity rate, and hospitalizations. At the end of January 2022, the number of daily cases saw a 45% decrease in one week and the daily positivity rate decreased to under 10% for the first time since December 23, 2021. Based on Omicron variant trends in other countries, this trend is expected to continue throughout February and into spring 2022.
Discussion
One of the main goals behind COVID-19 vaccination requirements is to increase vaccination rates among residents. The City of Santa Monica strongly urges all residents and the employees of all Santa Monica businesses to get a COVID-19 vaccination and booster as soon as possible. As of February 1, 2022, 91% of all Santa Monica residents over the age of 5 years old have received at least one COVID-19 vaccination. This is significantly higher than LA County’s current vaccination rate of 81.3%.
Since the start of the Omicron surge, Santa Monica’s Emergency Operations Center has focused attention on two specific areas related to vaccination with the largest improvement opportunity. To date, only 51.1% of eligible Santa Monica residents over the age of 12 years old had received a COVID-19 booster and 58.3% of children between the ages of 5-12 years old had received one dose of the COVID-19 vaccination.
To work to increase vaccination rates in these two categories, the Emergency Operations Center has focused attention by hosting two community vaccination clinics and concentrated public education through social media, digital newsletters and other forms of communications.
Another goal behind COVID-19 vaccination requirements of business patrons is to decrease the amount of COVID-19 transmission in a community. City Staff examined the impact that the COVID-19 indoor business vaccination requirement achieved in West Hollywood and Culver City in comparison to Santa Monica. Vaccination rates, change in 7-day adjusted case rates, and change in 14-day adjusted hospitalization rates were examined for each jurisdiction at different points in the implementation of the policy 5 of 9
requirement as well as after the Omicron variant surge had started. All three jurisdictions have comparable data and overall, there were no dramatic impacts to key COVID-19 data points that can be directly tied to the announcement or implementation of an indoor business vaccine requirement.
7-DAY ADJUSTED CASE RATE
Jurisdiction 9/10/2021 10/7/2021 11/4/2021 12/31/2021
Santa Monica 92 56 81 1668
Culver City 121 35 64 1659
West Hollywood 105 72 80 1637
14-DAY ADJUSTED HOSPITALIZATION RATE
Jurisdiction 9/10/2021 10/7/2021 11/4/2021 12/31/2021
Santa Monica 7 4 3 2
Culver City 4 0 6 12
West Hollywood 2 32 6 5
FULL VACCINATION RATE –AGES 5+
Jurisdiction 9/10/2021 10/7/2021 11/4/2021 12/31/2021
LA County 62.5% 64.7% 66.7% 71.3%
Santa Monica 73.8% 75.0% 76.2% 80.7%
Culver City 76.4% 78.4% 79.7% 86.2%
West Hollywood 71.0% 72.2% 73.4% 75.9%
* Dates include first date of announcing vaccination requirements for LA area businesses, first dose requirements, full vaccination requirements, and postOmicron impacts At this time City staff do not believe that it is necessary to move forward with a business indoor vaccination requirement beyond the current LA County Health Officer Order due to the following reasons:
• The City has historically aligned with the County of Los Angeles Department of Public Health Health Officer Order and the Health Officer has not expanded the existing Health Officer Order to include other sectors (e.g. restaurants) in response to the Omicron variant surge
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• Other public health departments within the Los Angeles region, the City of Long Beach and Pasadena, have also not expanded existing Health Officer Orders to include other sectors in response to the Omicron surge
• Lack of conclusive data suggesting that this type of policy impacts community COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, or vaccination
• 93% of Santa Monica residents have started their vaccination series against COVID-19, surpassing the benchmark previously identified to limit community transmission of vaccine-susceptible variants
• With the Omicron being the dominant, local COVID-19 variant and causing significant infections among vaccinated persons, at this point in time, there is lack of evidence that a business indoor vaccination policy that only requires individuals to be fully vaccinated reduces COVID-19 transmission among unmasked employees or patrons
• If a local emergency order or policy does not align with the local health authority’s Health Officer Order, it is unlikely that any related projects (outreach materials, staff time for enforcement, etc.) will be eligible for FEMA reimbursement and would have a financial impact if sustained
City staff recommend that the COVID-19 Emergency Operations Center team and City Manager reevaluate a local business indoor vaccination policy, in coordination with LA County DPH, should any of the following thresholds be met:
• The County of Los Angeles Department of Public Health expands its current indoor vaccination requirement to include other sectors based on epidemiological and surveillance data that suggests this requirement would be effective at reducing COVID-19 community rates or increasing COVID-19 vaccination rates 7 of 9
• A surge of a new/past dominant variant in LA County shows increased susceptibility to existing “fully vaccinated” COVID-19 vaccine regimen • The definition of “fully vaccinated” changes to include a booster shot (either the existing booster or a new booster) and Santa Monica’s resident population’s associated vaccination rate is lower than 80%
If it is determined that an indoor business vaccination requirement would provide vaccinated persons additional protection from COVID-19 infection and/or help facilitate an increase in vaccination rates, it is recommended that any the policy be presented by emergency management staff to the City Manager and then adopted through an amendment of the local Emergency Order.
City staff also recommend that the City continue existing and new Omicron surge measures to better support local businesses to reduce Omicron variant workplace transmission and prevent staff absenteeism. Recently implemented and new recommended prevention measures include:
• Maintain the activation of a Business Liaison position in the Emergency Operations Center until the Omicron surge reaches an average of 500 cases/week
• Continue Economic Recovery outreach calls for local Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) and other business stakeholders on monthly basis that include COVID-19 situation update and opportunity to share concerns, questions, and feedback for City staff.
• Continue to provide important updates to all Santa Monica businesses via the COVID-19 e-newsletter and the City’s Economic Recovery Webpage 8 of 9
• Promote the recent reimplementation of Curbside Zones to allow for easier pickup and delivery services until February 28, 2022 • In partnership with Santa Monica Travel & Tourism and PPE Unite, push out free hand sanitizer and medical-grade personal protective equipment resources, including 25,000 Kn95 masks, 10,000 surgical masks, and educate businesses on resources available through direct Health Ambassador education • Host a Business Resources Webinar to highlight support resources (e.g. State of CA COVID-19 employee paid sick leave) and to share best practice on how businesses may voluntarily implement vaccine requirements for their staff and/or the public
• Activate additional Health Ambassadors, either from City departments or asneeded personnel, to facilitate education/enforcement of the January 17, 2022 LA County requirement for all businesses to provide medical-grade personal protective equipment (PPE) for their staff and for staff to wear this PPE when working indoors
Financial Impacts
There is minimal financial impact or budget action necessary as a result of recommended action. The cost of an educational webinar is not expected to exceed $1,000.00. Re-implementation of curbside pick-up for businesses would create a temporary loss of meter parking revenue estimated at $125/meter per month. All City other costs are directly tied to existing LA County Health Officer Order requirements and therefore will be eligible for FEMA reimbursement. Future City budget impacts may include required additional staffing or other costs to support enforcement of this policy mandate if it should extend beyond the emergency declaration and become part of normal City operations.
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Prepared By: Lindsay Call, Chief Resilience Officer
Approved Forwarded to Council
Attachments:
A. 02082022_Addendum to 4A
B. Written Comment