The Municipality of Lakeshore has landed on a COVID-19 vaccination policy for its staff.
Council discussed the issue Tuesday night, but made some changes to what administration had recommended.
While vaccines will be highly encouraged, testing twice a week will be available to those who choose to remain unvaccinated and termination will not be used as a form of punishment.
Councillor Steven Wilder says employees shouldn't be fired over vaccinations.
"My biggest objection to this is termination," says Wilder. "I really am not prepared to go to that step with our employees. It's a serious and significant issue, I think we all acknowledge that, but we should tread lightly here because I'm very concerned about the potential litigation ramifications here if we start firing a bunch of employees."
Councillor John Kerr says employee rights can't be ignored.
"I worry about if we start firing people then they start taking us to court and we start losing that," says Kerr. "Are we going to be buying more vehicles with the double cab so that way we can accommodate workers so they can stay six feet apart? It's not like you can just fire them because they don't want to work."
Kerr adds he'd like to see more direction from upper levels of government.
"It just seems like we're taking this too far because the province and the feds haven't mandated it to us," he says. "So I'm so gun shy with this, I don't like it. I wish they would give it to us."
Due to changes being made, the modified policy was not passed by council Tuesday night.
Administration will draft a new policy and bring it back for approval at a future meeting.