The controversy over vaccine passports has resurfaced in Orange County, California, as a new potential contract with the firm that was paid $4 million to develop a digital vaccination tracking program recently appeared on multiple Board of Supervisors public meeting agendas—but was then removed.
According to county documents, County Health Officer Dr. Clayton Chau submitted on Nov. 21 a written request to the board’s clerk to move an item under the subject “Contract for Disease Control and Preventative Health Technology Enabled Solution” from the Nov. 29 meeting agenda to the Dec. 6 meeting agenda. Then, he asked that the item be deleted from that agenda the next day.
The item included approving a $3.4 million contract with Composite Apps, the company behind the vaccination verification app Othena, from Jan. 2, 2023 through Dec. 31, 2024.
Nicole Pearson, an attorney who is involved in a lawsuit against the county over its COVID-19 response policies, has accused the board of trying to hide plans to proceed with a vaccine passport program despite widespread community opposition.
“They keep hiding and obfuscating,” said Pearson. “Because they don’t want to hear from us. ... We have a dedicated group that is watching that. We’re watching the board agendas. I’m reviewing most of the contracts, the ones that we think are problematic. We sound the alarm, we send out a blog post, we do an email blast.”
Community Opposition
The Orange County Board of Supervisors voted to halt plans to establish digital vaccination records after more than 700 people gathered at a May 2021 board meeting to oppose what they called vaccine passports.Last year, Orange County officials increased spending from around $1 million to nearly $4 million for the Othena app, which tracks COVID-19 vaccinations in the county.
The county initially approved a no-bid contract, which was not listed on board meeting agendas, with Composite Apps for the app, created by CuraPatient, in the fall of 2020 at a cost of $1.2 million. In April last year, the county upped the spending to $3.8 million without disclosing the terms of the contract to the public.
According to the original contract, Composite Apps was to “integrate and maintain data sharing requirements and compliance with local, state, and federal vaccine tracking and logistics systems to ensure compliance to national protocols.”
Ellen Guevara, a public information officer for the Orange County Health Care Agency, told The Epoch Times the county doesn’t have a vaccine passport nor does it plan to create one. She said it does have the digital vaccine verification system that tracks COVID-19 vaccinations and boosters for those who use the Othena app or website.
“I can guarantee that we do not have a vaccine passport,” Guevara said.
Immunization Registry
In September, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation authorizing a statewide immunization registry to take effect on Jan. 1.Orange County’s Guevara deferred questions about how the new law and the statewide California Immunization Registry would affect county residents to the state.
Pearson, the attorney, said the registry intends to deliver data directly to the CDPH as well as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and other agencies deemed necessary for the maintenance of public health and safety.
The CDPH stated in an email that “no identifiable data” is shared with the CDC and that no data is stored on any servers outside the United States. The agency also said the state immunization registry is not a vaccine passport, but rather a “secure, confidential, statewide computerized immunization information system for California residents.”
Health care providers and other authorized users can access the registry to track patient immunization records to “reduce missed vaccine doses and help fully immunize Californians of all ages,” according to CDPH.
Counties are not expected to provide any data unless they are running a clinic administering vaccines, in which case the provider running the clinic will be required to report administered vaccinations to the state immunization registry, the agency stated in the email.
“Only providers administering [the] vaccine are required to report vaccinations to the state immunization registry,” according to the CDPH.
Emergency Powers
Pearson, who is also the founder of the legal organization Facts Law Truth Justice, alleges the county took advantage of residents during the pandemic lockdowns when they were most vulnerable, fearful, not paying attention, and overwhelmed with worries about their health, families, jobs, and homes.Under the local emergency declarations, the county abandoned the competitive bid process and didn’t post the contracts, Pearson said.
“They just plowed through with a lot of these no-bid contracts,” she said. “Typically, when there’s not an emergency, you post a contract for around 90 days. You have multiple bids, and you post it for the public to see, and then you choose one. You vote on it at a public meeting where people can come and comment.”
Pearson claims the county health agency has expanded exponentially during the pandemic and that the county has shown reluctance to relinquish its state of emergency powers, because it could lose out on state or federal COVID response funding in the future.
Legal Challenge
Pearson is the lead attorney for a lawsuit by Orange County resident Peggy Hall and the Children’s Health Defense (CHD) California chapter who are suing the County of Orange and the Orange County Board of Supervisors.The lawsuit was filed on May 4 at the Superior Court of California in Orange County and alleges that the county supervisors illegally voted to abdicate the board’s legal responsibilities and duties to assess whether local conditions justified an ongoing state of emergency.
“The Board improperly delegated this specific local statutory duty and authority entirely to the Governor, illegally tying the termination of any local state of emergency or local health emergency in Orange County to the Governor’s termination of the state-wide state of emergency,” the petition of writ states.
Newsom declared the state of emergency in March 2020 after the first COVID-related death in California was reported, and he used emergency powers to lock down businesses and schools and award no-bid contracts for masks, testing, and other responses.
The lawsuit alleges that Newsom issued “hundreds of far-reaching executive orders while he and his public health agency, CDPH, issued, removed, and then reissued numerous ‘public health’ mandates, including requirements on masking, testing, quarantining, and jab-for-job vaccination requirements that negatively affected every man, woman, and child in the state.”
Newsom promised a few weeks before the Nov. 8 election to end the COVID-19 state of emergency on Feb. 28, 2023.
“This timeline gives the health care system needed flexibility to handle any potential surge that may occur after the holidays in January and February, in addition to providing state and local partners the time needed to prepare for this phaseout and set themselves up for success afterwards,” Newsom said in a statement on Oct. 17.
Newsom’s planned end to the pandemic is “almost offensive,” Pearson said. “It’s not something that you can foresee will be terminated in five months. How outrageous!”
Pearson said she has asked the court to expedite the case since two consecutive judges have stepped away from the case and a third recently announced retirement.
Guevara said the Orange County Health Care Agency “cannot comment on ongoing litigation.”
