The Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously Wednesday to remove the requirement for indoor businesses to verify customers’ COVID-19 vaccination status.
But the vote does not make the move final, as an ordinance will have to be drafted by the city attorney and returned to the City Council for a final approval. A timeline for when that will take place was not immediately available.
Once approved, businesses and establishments such as restaurants, bars, gyms and movie theaters will not have to check their indoor patrons for proof of vaccination.
Even if the final ordinance is approved, vaccination verification will still be required at indoor mega events with 1,000 or more attendees, like concerts or games, since that is still required by L.A. County.
City Council President Nury Martinez last week introduced the motion to make vaccine verification voluntary and no longer require proof of vaccination at large outdoor events.
Martinez’ proposal came the day L.A. County eased masking rules and stopped requiring vaccine verification at outdoor mega events, bars, breweries, wineries, distilleries, night clubs and lounges.
Local jurisdictions can have rules stricter than the county’s, and L.A. currently requires people to show proof of full COVID-19 vaccination to enter restaurants, bars, gyms, movie theaters, concert venues, convention centers, card rooms, play areas, museums, play areas, spas, salons and indoor city facilities.
The city’s sweeping mandate, dubbed SafePassLA, was one of the nation’s strictest vaccine mandates when it went into effect in November and meant that L.A. businesses had to enforce stricter rules than those in surrounding county areas.
With COVID-19 case numbers declining after the omicron-fueled winter surge, the state and county have been loosening some restrictions. And although L.A. County is not yet at its pre-surge levels, the region has seen infection rates drop after reaching record-highs during the winter.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention went from categorizing L.A. County as having “high” COVID-19 risk to have “low” risk last week, triggering the changes to COVID-19 rules.
There are still 1.7 million eligible residents who haven’t yet received their first dose of COVID-19 vaccine, and 2.7 million eligible residents who haven’t been boosted.
