Cook County Judge Raymond Mitchell granted a partial temporary restraining order, requiring that the city cannot enforce the Dec. 31 deadline for CPD officers to get vaccinated against COVID-19, but said that “the reporting and testing obligations”—or testing twice a week under city policy—still remain in effect
Disputes over vaccinations should be handled as a labor grievance with an arbitrator, Mitchell said.
“The effect of this order is to send these parties back to the bargaining table and to promote labor peace by allowing them to pursue” remedies under Illinois law, the judge added.
City workers who fail to meet the deadlines will be put on a no-pay status, Lightfoot’s administration said in announcing the mandate weeks ago.
“The principal risk to those who are unvaccinated is to themselves and to others who choose to be unvaccinated,” the judge said.
Police have lagged behind other city departments in meeting the vaccine requirements, but the numbers have been slowly increasing. City data released Monday showed about 73 percent of CPD employees had reported their COVID-19 vaccination status, and about 80 percent of those employees reported being fully vaccinated.
“In light of that terrible sacrifice, the police union’s request just to have their grievances heard seems a pretty modest task,” Mitchell said.
“We continue to encourage our department members to get the COVID-19 vaccine. This is about officer safety, as we’ve said repeatedly, and it’s about protecting our families and the people we serve,” Brown said.
According to the news outlet, a status hearing in the case has been set for Nov. 10 at 1 p.m. local time.
The Epoch Times has contacted FOP President John Catanzara and Lightfoot’s office for comment.
“I’ve made my status very clear as far as the vaccine, but I do not believe the city has the authority to mandate that to anybody—let alone that information about your medical history,” he said at the time.
