Dear friends,
We have achieved Friday. It was another wild week and I am not even going to touch on the flushing of official documents.
Today, NYC will terminate workers who have held out against the city mandate for public servants to get the COVID vaccination. There was a protest march involving a few hundred unvaccinated workers and there will likely be lawsuits.
The mayor has been clear that the mandate is a public safety issue and that workers who lose their jobs are making a choice.
“It’s up to them,” he added. “They’re quitting.”
The question of punishment has been on my mind this week. Yesterday, I learned that those who refuse to comply with the mandate are, from a legal standpoint, ineligible for unemployment benefits because their refusal is considered “just cause for termination.”
No Democrats in NYS have stepped forward to co-sponsor legislation to make vaccine refuseniks eligible for unemployment.
But when the city’s Human Resources Administration issued guidelines to deny refuseniks access to SNAP benefits and Cash Assistance, some progressive leaders pointed out that this is punitive and unprincipled. Among them are two assembly members Linda Rosenthal, chairwoman of the Committee on Social Services, and Queens rep Jessica González-Rojas.
Brad Lander, NYC’s Comptroller remarked
No one should be denied food stamps if they are hungry and out of money, even if the reason they need assistance is that they made a bad decision to not get vaccinated.
A hearty thank you to Matthew Thomas who chased down this story.
The mayor is right that public employees are making a choice. They do not have to work for the city. Although the recent jobs report appears to have been distorted, there are still jobs available in the private sector that do not require workers to get vaccinations.
It is also right to permit those who are terminated for noncompliance to take advantage of public assistance programs. They are still members of our society and deserving of compassion.
Please thank the mayor for standing firm on the vaccine mandate AND call on him to rectify HRA policy on eligibility for public assistance. This is a ready-made action!
A recent audit by our Comptroller found that many
families get rejected from homeless shelter without required review.
People experiencing homelessness and their advocates are not surprised by the finding, which conforms to their lived experience. We will not take action at this time because it appears that the new Administration is sensitive to this issue.
Read this powerful story about the obstacles to finding housing faced by people who were formerly incarcerated.
There are glimmers of hope in this story. A few years ago, Fair Chance legislation in NYC made it illegal for employers to ask about an applicant’s history with the criminal justice system before considering their application.
Contact your council member to ask them to introduce or co-sponsor legislation to prohibit housing discrimination on the basis of arrest record or criminal history.
One of the most important ways that we tend the soil is to bring people into community instead of casting them out.
Have a great weekend!
with love,
L