WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 19 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ SU B5
BY KARINA ELWOODThe first weekend of D.C.’s new
vaccination requirement to enter
bars, restaurants and other in-
door businesses ended with only
one business citywide reported
for not enforcing the rule.
The mandate, which requires
patrons of indoor businesses to
show proof of vaccination and
matching identification, went
into effect Saturday for sit-down
restaurants, bars, gyms, theaters
and most other public places
where people spend long periods
sitting inside.
Grocery stores, retail stores
and houses of worship are among
the locations exempt.
Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D)
said at a n ews conference Tuesday
that the Alcoholic Beverage Regu-
lation Administration (ABRA)
was in charge of enforcing the
mandate among businesses with
liquor licenses, a group that in-
cludes most restaurants and bars.
“Teams have been out to see if our
establishments have any ques-
tions or we can offer any support,
or to see if we need to encourage
them to make sure they are en-
forcing the rules,” Bowser said.
She added that police would
only get involved with mandate
enforcement if it was regarding a
criminal matter.
Enforcement of the District’s
vaccine mandate follows a similar
process already in place for other
mandates, such as indoor mask
requirements. ABRA inspectors
routinely visit businesses to
check for compliance and follow
up on tips and complaints sub-
mitted by the public, said Jared
Powell, the agency’s chief of staff
and spokesman.
Powell said the enforcement
division received six notices of
potential violations from the pub-
lic be tween Friday evening and
Tuesday afternoon.
But according to a weekly re-
port of citations and warnings
issued by ABRA, only one D.C.
business, the H Street NE bar and
restaurant the Big Board, has
received a warning for violating
the vaccine mandate. T he Big
Board also received verbal and
written warnings for staff not
wearing masks, the report shows.
A third violation of staff masking
requirements would result in a$1,000 fine.
Owners of the Big Board did
not immediately respond to an
email about the warning Tuesday,
and a person who answered the
phone said no one was available
to respond to questions over the
phone.
The establishment had tele-
graphed, however, that such a
violation was forthcoming. On
Thursday, two days before the
mandate was to take effect, the
Big Board’s Twitter account post-
ed: “As has always been the case
for us, everyone is welcome. This
rule applies yesterday, today and
tomorrow. Hopefully we’ll see
you January 16th.”
The tweet gained hundreds of
likes and comments. Some users
praised the business and prom-
ised their support, while others
criticized the restaurant for sug-
gesting it would not check vacci-
nation status.
District businesses spent the
weeks leading up to Saturday
training staff and planning their
systems to check for proof of
vaccination. S ome, such as the
Florida Avenue NW beer hall
Franklin Hall, put their own vac-
cine rules in place ahead of the
city mandate.
Many small-business owners
told The Washington Post theyfelt optimistic about the new rule,
which marks just the latest safety
protocol they have had to navi-
gate since the onset of the corona-
virus pandemic. Others worried
about losing business or the add-
ed responsibility of checking vac-
cine cards.
At the other end of H Street NE
from the Big Board, Donna Dur-
ante-Miller, owner of the E lroy, a
bar and hookah lounge, said she
had to turn away multiple groups
Saturd ay night because they
didn’t have vaccine cards. She
said most would-be customers
didn’t yet know about the rule. “I
hated to see people leave,” Dur-
ante-Miller said. “But there’s
nothing we can do.”
Bowser said District staff have
been in communication with
neighboring Montgomery Coun-
ty, which is considering a similar
“vaccine passport.”
Bowser said District staff have
been in communication with
neighboring Montgomery Coun-
ty, which is instituting a “vaccine
passport.” Officials in the subur-
ban Maryland county have pro-
posed rules that would closely
mirror the District’s.
[email protected]Jenna Portnoy contributed to this
report.THE DISTRICT
First weekend of vaccine rule for restaurants, bars
One business is reported
for not enforcing the
new citywide mandateBY NICOLE ASBURY
AND JULIE ZAUZMER WEILD.C. public schools will be
required to notify parents within
24 hours if any student in their
child’s classroom tests positive
for the coronavirus, under new
legislation passed by the D.C.
Council on Tuesday.
The emergency legislation,
which heads to Mayor Muriel E.
Bowser (D) for her signature or
veto, passed the council unani-
mously.
Council member Robert C.
White Jr. (D-At Large), who in-
troduced the bill, backed down
from an initial proposal to re-
quire schools to establish specif-
ic numerical thresholds for oper-
ating virtually instead of in-per-
son when plagued by a high
number of coron avirus cases.
Instead, the legislation passed
Tuesday includes other measures
to improve transparency about
the virus.
In addition to se tting a d ead-
line to notify parents of virus
cases, the measure also requires
the school system to update the
council monthly on Bowser’s as-
yet-unfulfilled vow to hire coro-
navirus facilitators and full-time
substitute teachers. It also re-
quires the Office of the State
Superintendent of Education to
give a weekly report of how many
students in each school partici-
pate in the city’s asymptomatic
testing program.
“Right now, schools are not
able to get the information to
parents quickly enough, because
it has to go through sort of a long
bureaucratic process, and we do
have to cut th at process down for
the safety of our students and
staff,” said White, who is running
against Bowser in the city’s Dem-
ocratic mayoral primary and has
critiqued her management of the
school system.
After Thanksgiving, D.C.
schools saw a surge in coronavi-
rus cases, leading several schools
to temporarily shift to virtual
instru ction. Parents, teachers
and staff complained about alack of communication from D.C.
Public Schools, saying case noti-
fications to families didn’t in-
clude the total number of posi-
tive cases in the buildin g, and
sometimes, the communication
was delayed by two to three days.
D.C. Public Schools has previ-
ously said it would start notify-
ing parents of the total number
of cases and would expedite the
notifications.
Bowser pledged in October to
hire “covid strategy and logistics
coordinators” to help carry out
case notifications, contact trac-
ing and student testing in
schools. But as of mid-January,
school officials said they have
had difficulty hiring any of the
promised staffers because of a
national staffing sho rtage.
White said during the council
meeting that he intends to advo-
cate for more measures, includ-
ing bringing back coronavirus-
specific paid leave time for staff
when they or family members
are sick — an idea City Adminis-
trator Kevin Donahue has toldthe council he is working on
implementing.
“I think we see returning to
schools as a b inary choice —
either we do it at any cost or
don’t do it at all,” council mem-
ber Elissa Silverman (I-At Large)
said. “But we need to continu-
ously make adjustments neces-
sary to contain and mitigate the
virus.”
Local educators have also
aske d the city to bring back
coronavirus le ave and to provide
KN95 masks for students. Mean-
while, Bowser announced Tues-
day that she would raise substi-
tute teachers’ pay, at a time when
substitutes are in extremely high
demand with regular teachers
out sick with the coronavirus.
Bowser said substitutes’ pay will
rise from $15.20 per hour to $17
per hour so that teachers substi-
tuting for up to 29 days per
school year will earn $136 for
each day they work.
In other business, the council
also voted Tuesday to extend
until June the District’s mor ato-rium on foreclosures for home-
owners, which had been set to
expire Feb. 4.
C ouncil member Janeese Lew-
is George (D -Ward 4), who intro-
duced the measure, said the city
has yet to receive money that it
expects from the fede ral govern-
ment — about $50 million — to
create a relief fund for home-
owners behind on their mortgag-
es similar to the relief the fede ral
government already provided for
renters.
The mor atorium will last until
the end of September for owners
who apply for the relief money,
Lewis George said.
“ They won’t lose their home
before they have the opportunity
to apply for the assi stance prom-
ised by Congress,” she said.
Co uncil Chair Phil Mendelson
(D) raised concerns that delin-quent homeowners who are not
paying their condominium fees
are burdening the condo associa-
tions that must continue paying
for their utilities — p ossibly
meaning neighbors in their
buildings must pay significantly
more to cover the water and
other utilities used by those who
are avoiding foreclosure because
of the moratorium.
Lewis George’s bill to extend
the moratorium passed unani-
mously, but Mendelson said he
might offer amendments to ad-
dress the condo problem at the
counci l’s Feb. 1 m eeting.
That meeting will once again
take place by Zoom. The council
agreed on Tuesday to keep post-
poning their return to in-person
meetings until Feb. 15.
[email protected]
[email protected]THE DISTRICT
Council rule requires schools to tell parents about covid cases in 24 hours
case rates are dropping and even
hospitalizations are starting to
reflect the drop, and we expect
the omicron surge to be on the
downturn very soon, the death
rate has not,” he said. “The death
rate has surged.”
Anne Arundel’s previous sev-
en-day record for deaths, 30, was
set last January.
Anne Arundel Health Officer
Nilesh Kalyanaraman said hospi-
talizations in the county are
showing “a glimmer of a good
sign,” by appearing to plateau
with 230 patients Tuesday.
Maryland has experienced a
10 percent decline in hospitaliza-
tions in the past week, and its
seven-day average case rate has
dropped in half, from a high of
16,158 earlier this month to 8,444
on Tuesda y, according to data
tracked by The Washington Post.
Deaths, on the other hand, are
seeing a slight uptick. According
to The Post’s tracker, the seven-
day average of deaths was nearly
2 percent higher than last week.
“Please, please, please,” Kaly-
anaraman said, “if you know
anyone who is not vaccinated
against covid-19, plead with
them to do so.”
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]Nicole Asbury and Jacqueline
Dupree contributed to this report.The deb ate comes as D.C.,
Maryland and Virginia report a
slight drop in infection rates and
an increase in deaths, which
experts say typically follows a
surge in cases.
In Maryland, Anne Arundel
County Executive Steuart Pitt-
man opened his weekly covid
briefing on a somber note Tues-
day, announcing that 39 resi-
dents died of covid-19 last week
— the highest weekly total since
the start of the pandemic.
“While the good news is thatdocuments, he said, and having
police officers enforce the vac-
cine passport — as is currently
proposed — could heighten anxi-
ety in communities of color.
“Insuf ficient thought has been
given to the vaccine mandate,”
Vasquez said. “It could promote
social inequities.”
To take effect, the bill needs to
be approved by the Montgomery
County Council, which is sched-
uled to vote on it on Tuesday.
Baltimore City is also consid-
ering a vaccine passport.county and in D.C.
“Its negative consequences far
outweigh the benefits,” said Mau-
ricio Vasquez, a b oard member of
the Hispanic Chamber of Com-
merce for Montgomery County.
The chamber “fully supports”
efforts to increase vaccine up-
take, he said, but is concerned a
sweeping mandate would be
costly and difficult for small
businesses to enforce.
Not all residents in the county
have identification cards to veri-
fy against proof of vaccinationThe health resolution pro-
posed by County Executive Marc
Elrich (D) would require all resi-
dents 5 or older to provide proof
of full vaccination to enter res-
taurants, bars, fitness centers
and other indoor facilities.
Those who have medical or
religious exemptions would be
excluded. This proposal is more
stringent than the requirement
that recently took effect in D.C.,
which requires proof of vaccina-
tion from those 12 or older. Mask
mandates remain in effect in thecent coronavirus deaths.
“The one common thing these
people are dying from is... being
unvaccinated,” Ashley said.
Sequencing shows 70 percent
of new infections are due to the
omicron variant and 30 percent
are delta, he said. The cit y’s
health department will continue
to stock tests at select libraries,
firehouses and other locations.
Bowser added that more than
6,000 D.C. Public Schools prekin-
dergarten students submitted re-
sults — nearly 100 percent com-
pliance — as part of a weekly and
mandatory testing program new-
ly rolled out by the school sys-
tem. The program targets prekin-
dergarten students who are not
yet eligible for vaccination. The
reported positivity rate was less
than 1 percent, which is lower
than the rate among older kids,
she said.
The report came three days
after the city instituted a v accine
requirement for retail stores and
restaurants. Officials in Mont-
gomery County, which according
to the Centers for Disease Con-
trol and Prevention has an 85
percent vaccination rate, are con-
sidering a similar policy.
County residents and business
owners who turned out to oppose
the proposed vaccine passport at
a virtual public hearing Tuesday
said it would not slow the spread
of the coronavirus and would
burden businesses already suf-
fering amid the pandemic, driv-
ing economic activity away from
the county.
Some speakers threatened to
vote out council members in the
upcoming Democratic primary if
they voted for the vaccine pass-
port; others warned that such a
mandate would force restaurants
and retail employees to become
proof-of-vaccine enforcers, possi-
bly placing themselves at risk of
backlash from unhappy patrons.
VIRUS FROM B1
Vaccine passport proposal not immune to public criticism
SARAH L. VOISIN/THE WASHINGTON POST
Rapid antigen tests are distributed Tuesday at a new D.C. center for coronavirus vaccination and testing. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser
unveiled plans to open eight such centers citywide amid a recognition that covid is “going to be part of our lives for the foreseeable future.”‘Insufficient thought has
been given to the
vaccine mandate. I t
could promote social
inequities.”
Mauricio Vasquez, of the Hispanic
Chamber of Commerce for
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