Monday marked the deadline for thousands of San Francisco city employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and return to work.
But while San Francisco reports a 98% vaccination rate among its employees, there are enough holding out on the shot to impact some city services, particularly on Muni routes.
Muni's Rapid 14 Mission is one of the lines the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency said will be temporarily suspended during the week due to the vaccine deadline and a number of employees who will face discipline for not meeting it.
Several short lines, including the 1 California and 14 Mission Rapid, will be temporarily suspended during the week. The short lines supplementing the 30 Stockton and 49 Van Ness will also be suspended over the weekend.
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Despite worries of mass driver shortages, the SFMTA said the fallout from some drivers missing the vaccine deadline will be minimal to riders.
SFMTA officials said the changes are intended to reduce impacts to service systemwide and will likely mean more crowded buses and longer wait times for riders.
One SFMTA employee told NBC Bay Area on Monday that rush hour was heavily impacted in the morning and he anticipates it may get worse in the coming days.
While some worry, city leaders continue to look at the bright side, saying 98% of the city's workforce is vaccinated. Mayor London Breed said she is also working closely to get the rest onboard.
"I'm really proud of the people of this city, of our workforce in this city," Breed said. "And I'm grateful because we have so much work to do, and we're gonna get it done."
For those who have yet to get vaccinated or disclose their vaccination status, the city's human resources department stresses it does not want to cut any employee, but will if it has to.
"We want everybody to stay working and we're doing everything that we can so we can talk to every city employee individually," said Carol Isen, San Francisco's human resources director. "And we hope that we don't have to separate anybody at the end."
The mayor said less than 1,000 employees remain unvaccinated or have not shared their status. SFMTA specifically has less than 100 employees who are in that category and is hoping that number drops further in the coming weeks.
