Vallejo council to consider extending city’s mask mandate

VALLEJO - The Vallejo City Council is expected to approve two COVID-19 related actions during a special meeting Tuesday night.

The council will first be asked to renew a mask mandate which requires individuals 4 years and older to wear a face covering while inside any buildings open to the general public within city limits. This includes office buildings, restaurants, laundromats, and grocery stores.

Vallejo adopted the new mandate, which took effect immediately, on the last day of August, becoming the second Solano County city to adopt such a position. A week earlier, the Benicia City Council passed a similar measure.

The city council is required to renew the mandate every six weeks until at least 80 percent of the city’s population is fully vaccinated against COVID or until Vallejo is not considered to have substantial or high transmission rates as defined by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

City officials previously said that those fully vaccinated from the virus are still required to comply with the mandate.  

Also before the council is the adoption of a resolution authorizing the city council to continue holding its meetings via teleconference.

The council held a lengthy discussion at its last meeting about whether to resume holding council meetings in city hall or move to a hybrid model of having the council meet in public while having the meeting broadcast via teleconference. Vallejo’s chief innovation officer, Naveed Ashraf, told the council that it would take his team about a month to set up the hybrid model. Those meetings could start in November.

“As this state of local emergency continues to impact the City, in-person meetings of the City's legislative bodies would present an imminent risk to the health and safety of attendees,” a staff report to the council says. The report says staff will present the council on Oct. 26 with “information and the costs of conducting hybrid meetings,” which could come as early as Nov. 9.

The Vallejo school district and Benicia City Council have adopted similar measures allowing those bodies to continue meeting via teleconference.

During the initial months of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order loosening Brown Act requirements for agencies,  allowing them to meet over teleconference. The state legislature passed a law extending the provisions of Newsom’s order.

The Vallejo City Council is set to meet at 6 p.m, Tuesday via teleconference.