The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department could lose 4,000 employees due to not being vaccinated for COVID-19.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors was scheduled to meet Tuesday morning and vote on an agenda item concering the vaccine mandate for county employees.
CBSLA reported Monday night that the board of supervisors will explore new ways to enforce the vaccine mandate for county employees.
An executive order in August mandated that all county employees be fully vaccinated by Oct. 1, 2021, or face disciplinary action including termination.
Currently, 18,000 employees — 4,000 from the sheriff's department — have not complied with COVID-19 vaccination requirements. More than 3,000 of those Sheriff’s Department employees are sworn deputies, CBSLA reported.
"Tomorrow at 9:30 am the @LACountyBOS will vote on Agenda Item #18, which is a Motion to terminate 18K @CountyofLA employees (4K from LASD) for not being vaccinated,” the sheriff’s department tweeted Monday afternoon.
"These are the same law enforcement professionals, fire professionals, medical & health care professional mental health professionals, and others who we called HERO’s just a short time ago. Call the Board meeting tomorrow to share your public safety concerns and stop this social experimentation!" the tweet read.
L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva, who opposes the county's vaccine mandate, argues that firing so many sheriff's department employees would be a threat to public safety.
With only 81.5% — approximately 82,000 county employees — fully vaccinated, the board wants to learn if officials can assign disciplinary responsibilities to another official rather than the heads of each department.
The board meeting comes less than a month after a federal judge dismissed a lawsuit by Los Angeles police officers challenging the city’s COVID-19 vaccination and testing mandate, rejecting their claims that it violated their constitutional rights.
Villanueva has said that he would not discipline members of his department, and will continue with voluntary compliance to the vaccine mandate. The sheriff’s office continued to require testing for the unvaccinated.
Unlike Villanueva, Los Angeles Police Chief Michel Moore said he would enforce the city's vaccine mandate and was prepared to fire any department employee who fails to comply.
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