After 57 speakers weighed in on both sides of the question of mandatory vaccines or testing for COVID 19 — often politely, sometimes angrily, but always intensely — the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors voted 4-1 to require all 4,610 county employees to either get vaccinated or to submit to weekly tests beginning September 30.
Many supes took pains to stress it was not a mandate but a choice. As of this Monday, county HR officials had verified that 59 percent of all county workers had already been vaccinated. A little more than a third — 34.4 percent — declined to say.
As has been the case during the prior two meetings when the issue was being debated, the argument against vaccinations was exceptionally heated. Pro-vaccination supervisors again found themselves compared to Nazi Germany. Adolf Hitler, one speaker noted, defended his actions on the grounds of “the common good.” Another speaker noted that the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz started off as a quarantine center for the sick.