After having to get tested for COVID-19 on their own time, unvaccinated police officers will now get paid by New York City for the time spent getting mandated tests to prove they are not infected.
The New York Post reported Friday that New York City Police Department officers may be pulled from patrol duty to help the medical division issue the tests to roughly 50 percent of the department, which is currently not vaccinated against the virus.
The change comes just after the NYPD announced a policy where officers would have to get tested on their own time to prove they were negative, or get sent home without pay, the Post previously reported.
The tests are mandated by the executive order of Mayor Bill de Blasio who ordered in July that all city employees be either vaccinated or prove weekly that they were not infected.
The vaccinate or test mandate includes the more than 300,000 employees of the city, NYPD, and Department of Education.
The move, according to the Post, is a reversal of the stricter policy that shocked the department’s police unions; they were initially told the city would foot the bill for the time the testing would take.
After threatening a grievance to the Board of Collective Bargaining, the department changed its policy on allowing officers to be tested while on the clock and will not force officers to prove a negative result each week, according to the story.
NYPD will set up between 8-10 testing centers in the commands with the largest number of unvaccinated staff, the Post reported, based on an email to members from the Detective Endowment Association.
Other commands will be issued self-testing kits.
Union leaders were informed of the changes Friday afternoon by Police Commissioner Dermot Shea, according to the Post.
As of July, 35,000 uniformed officers and 18,000 civilians, or about 47% of the agency, were fully vaccinated against the virus, while an estimated 80% of city residents have had at least one dose of the three available vaccines.
Nationwide, 53.6% of the population is fully vaccinated with 62.9% getting at least one dose, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In New York State, 61.2% of the population is fully vaccinated with 68.6% getting at least one dose of the vaccine.
Unvaccinated officers continue to have to always wear masks while on duty, the Post reported.
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