Bill de Blasio diverted FDNY building inspectors to montior vaccine mandate enforcement at restaurants with deadly results

 

NY Daily News

 A Bronx building that became a towering inferno in January, leaving 17 dead, was scheduled to be examined by an FDNY fire inspector several months beforehand — but it didn’t happen because the inspector was reassigned to conduct COVID restaurant inspections.

 The troubling account came from Oren Barzilay, president of the union that represents paramedics and fire inspectors who testified Wednesday at a hearing held by the City Council’s Fire and Emergency Management Committee.

“That building was scheduled to be inspected, but because they were sent to a task force, that building was not inspected,” he testified.

“It’s terrible,” he told the Daily News after his testimony. “I’m not blaming Eric Adams. I’m blaming the previous administration for not thinking it through.”

The Jan. 9 blaze at Twin Parks North West in the Bronx killed 17 people and left dozens more injured. The fire was caused by a faulty space heater that burst into flames and made worse by malfunctioning doors that were designed to close on their own. Because the doors failed to shut, the toxic smoke spread quickly through the 19-story building.

The blaze was the deadliest in the city since the Happy Land night club fire killed 87 people in 1990.

Barzilay told the Daily News an inspector was assigned to Twin Parks about a year before the fire took place to examine the building’s stand pipe system, which would supply it with water in the event of a fire. Barzilay noted that while inspectors wouldn’t have focused on inspecting doors, any problems they saw would have been flagged and addressed.

“If they had noticed anything else, they would have addressed the issue,” he said.

Barzilay also noted a Brooklyn building that was the site of an explosion recently was also slated to be inspected before the incident, but was not because inspectors were diverted to enforce vaccine mandates at city restaurants. Mayor Adams rolled back those requirements, known as the Key2NYC, on Monday.

The Key to NYC will die, the masks are coming off

 

NY Post

Vaccine passports will no longer be required in New York City starting March 7, Mayor Eric Adams said Sunday — and he plans on lifting school mask mandates then, too, barring “unforeseen spikes” in COVID cases.

Adams said he plans on following Gov. Kathy Hochul’s lead in nixing masks in schools but would make the final determination this Friday.

“At the end of this week, we will evaluate the numbers and make a final announcement on Friday. If we see no unforeseen spikes and our numbers continue to show a low level of risk, New York City will remove the indoor mask mandate for public school children,” Hizzoner said in a statement.

But he said starting March 7, patrons at Big Apple restaurants, gyms and indoor venues will no longer be required to show proof of vaccination.

“Additionally, New York City’s numbers continue to go down day after day, so, as long as COVID indicators show a low level of risk and we see no surprises this week, on Monday, March 7 we will also lift Key2NYC requirements,” the mayor said, referring to rules imposed last year by then-Mayor Bill de Blasio requiring proof of vaccination for indoor dining, indoor fitness, indoor entertainment and certain meeting spaces.

NY Post

Mask mandates in public schools across New York will be lifted this Wednesday, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Sunday — and she feels “confident” Big Apple Mayor Eric Adams will follow suit but said it’s ultimately up to him.

Speaking from Albany, Hochul said local governments would now be empowered to set their own school mask requirements in accordance with new guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released on Friday that reclassified much of the state as “low risk” for COVID infection.

“Given the decline in our rates, our hospitalizations, strong vaccination rates and the CDC guidance, we, friends, the day has come,” Hochul said. “Today we are going to be announcing that we’ll be lifting the statewide mask requirement in schools, and that’ll be effective this Wednesday, March 2.”

Hochul said she had spoken to Mayor Eric Adams and “feels confident” he will follow her lead and yank the city’s school mask requirement, but declined to speak on his behalf.

“My position is to empower the local governments to make the decisions for their entire county. But I’ve always said that if there are entities within and we’re going to whether it’s a city, a school district and school if they choose to be more restrictive. We will not prohibit that whatsoever,” she said.

Mayor Swagger plans to lift indoor mandate but not workplace mandate

  

NY Daily News

Mayor Adams plans to roll back the city’s coronavirus vaccine and mask mandates for indoor settings as infection rates continue to drop across New York.

The mayor didn’t give an exact timeline for when he envisions ending the longstanding pandemic precautions, but told reporters at an unrelated press conference in Brooklyn Wednesday that rescinding the “Key to NYC” vaccination requirement for dining and other indoor activities is a top priority for him.

“I can’t wait to get it done,” Adams said.

Unprompted, Adams then suggested he’s also looking to relax or even outright scrap the city’s rules on mask-wearing.

“I look forward in the next few weeks to going through a real transformation that I don’t have to wonder what you look like. I will know what you look like again,” he said, motioning to masked reporters in the room.

Under current city rules, masks must be worn in schools, health care settings, many entertainment venues and while on public transit. The city also recommends that masks be worn in congested public indoor spaces, like grocery stores.

Coronavirus vaccinations, meantime, are mandated for most public indoor activities, like drinking and eating at restaurants and bars.

 Though he’s targeting “Key to NYC” for tweaks, Adams has no plans to revisit the private employer mandate, according to a City Hall official.

Vaccinated and masked NYPD bounce a child out of Applebee's

NYPD kicks out a child for not having a vaccine passport.

pic.twitter.com/2bkeK0sRnv

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) December 28, 2021

The NYPD is officially enforcing The Blaz's vaccine extortion mandate.

A group of 30 + antivaxxers claiming to be doing a “sit in” refused to check in at the host stand, skipped waiting customers, and sat themselves across multiple tables in a Cheesecake Factory in NYC.

They are now arguing with police. One antivaxxer compared the police to Nazis. pic.twitter.com/elFKOoTZ98

— PatriotTakes 🇺🇸 (@patriottakes) December 15, 2021

4 people ended up being arrested after refusing to leave. The antivaxxer group called it segregation and discrimination.

In reality, they skipped paying customers waiting in line. Seems like a bad strategy. pic.twitter.com/pdBMTmvCSR

— PatriotTakes 🇺🇸 (@patriottakes) December 15, 2021

The Blaz now wants full vaccination status for participating in society

  

NY Daily News

A day after announcing five people in New York State tested positive for COVID’s omicron variant, Mayor de Blasio said Friday he is considering tightening vaccine mandates when it comes to restaurants and concert venues.

Such a mandate could include a second shot of the COVID vaccine, as well as boosters shots.

“With all of our approaches to COVID, we’re going to update them because we’re dealing with some new challenges,” he said. “We’re going to keep updating policies regularly to meet this challenge.”

De Blasio was responding to a question from WNYC’s Brian Lehrer about whether the city would require people seeking to eat indoors or attend concerts to show that they’ve been fully vaccinated — as opposed to providing proof of just one shot, which is the current requirement.

“That will be looked at along with a series of other actions because it’s really dynamic right now,” de Blasio said.

The mayor also pointed out that it is not just omicron he’s concerned about, but the spread of COVID’s delta variant in the winter months as well.

De Blasio, who is contemplating a gubernatorial run next year after he is term-limited out of office as mayor, was speaking a day after appearing alongside Gov. Hochul at City Hall on Thursday to alert New Yorkers that the heavily mutated omicron variant had found its way to the Empire State.

This idiot wanting to do this in the last hours of his abominable reign as mayor confirms that it's his and Davey Chokshi's fault that he elongated the COVID era by letting the Delta variant spread with the initial mandate.

Was this today????

 

AMNY

The city will deploy inspectors to enforce the vaccine mandate for restaurants, bars, gyms, and other indoor venues starting Monday, Sept. 13.

Municipal workers will check on the businesses to make sure they require workers and patrons aged 12 or older to have at least their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.

Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the new regime last month, when the policy known as Key to NYC first went into effect on Aug. 17, giving businesses almost four weeks to prepare for the requirements.

“This is going to reach hundreds of thousands of people and convince them it’s time,” de Blasio said at the time. “We know this is going to work because New Yorkers love our arts, our culture, entertainment, restaurants — they’re part of who we are.”

The mandate covers eateries, indoor fitness, and entertainment venues like movie theaters, museums, and concert halls, and de Blasio hopes the measures will boost inoculations among younger New Yorkers, who still lag well behind older residents for vaccination rates.

“I am absolutely certain this is going to motivate a lot of people to get vaccinated, particularly young people,” he said in August. “We know one of the biggest areas of concern is reaching younger New Yorkers.”

Hizzoner said New Yorkers can show proof with the paper card, the Excelsior Pass, or the NYC COVID SAFE app.

NYPD won’t be part of the enforcement, which will instead have civilian inspectors from 13 city agencies, such as FDNY, Department of Health, Buildings, Sanitation, and Transportation.