El Camino College’s vaccine mandate is in the process of being lifted as the college adopts a new policy following the guidelines set by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health.

The Board of Trustees voted unanimously in favor of the new COVID-19 policy replacement during its meeting on Oct. 17.

Currently, the LA County Department of Public Health encourages everyone to get vaccinated, however, should LA County decide to require vaccinations again for certain businesses and organizations, El Camino College will follow suit.

The Board of Trustees initially motioned to fully rescind the vaccine mandate but only achieved two votes. A counter motion to keep the vaccination policy in place also received two votes.

The consensus on a decision for the vaccine requirement reached a stalemate until Trustee Cliff Numark proposed a compromise.

Numark’s motion to the board allows the college the opportunity to reinstate the vaccine mandate should the number of COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations see another increase. The new motion was universally accepted by the board.

“I feel more comfortable with that, because then it could change if we have another surge, another variant, then we would require vaccinations,” Trustee Trisha Murakawa said. “I personally feel more comfortable with that [motion] as opposed to lifting and then having another variant.”

The new policy marks a significant change for the El Camino community, ending the original year-long policy adoption that made vaccinations a requirement during the Sept. 7, 2021 board meeting.

Additionally, El Camino’s COVID-19 policy update also affects the mask mandate on campus with masking being encouraged but not required by the LA County Department of Public Health.

El Camino’s new COVID-19 policy follows a string of announcements that saw the college reduce the number of COVID-19 related protocols that were in effect.

At the beginning of the fall semester, El Camino College loosened its COVID-19 protocols with the announcement that they no longer require students to check-in with health screening kiosks on campus to receive their wristbands.

On Oct. 5, El Camino announced that students and employees exempt from vaccinations are no longer required to test for COVID-19.

El Camino now joins other local community colleges such as Santa Monica, East Los Angeles, Cerritos, Rio Hondo, and San Diego Mesa College in lifting their vaccination requirements.

While no specific date was given for when the new COVID-19 policy will be implemented, El Camino College’s President Brenda Thames said now that the board has set this new policy, it will go through the “appropriate delegation of authority” before its full implementation goes into effect.

“That was a policy vote we had and it’s obviously up to the administration to determine how and when that policy gets executed,” Numark said. “…the vote was had and we made a good decision but really, it’s up to [President] Thames to figure out how it gets executed in a way that makes sense for the community at large.”

Student Trustee Sidney Lee said that she surveyed hundreds of students on campus over several days to find out their preferences in regards to El Camino’s vaccine mandate.

“I received 435 responses. Of the 435 [students], 229 or about 52.6% said yes that they would want El Camino to keep the vaccine mandate. 206 [out] of the 435 students [47.4%] said they would not want El Camino to keep the vaccine mandate,” Lee said.

While the data that Lee collected is more favorable in keeping El Camino’s previous vaccine mandate, she notes that she did not get the chance to survey students online.

Lee also said that the college’s vaccine mandate was negatively affecting student outreach for enrollment and college events.

“I know that there’s a barrier preventing prospective students from engaging with El Camino and even in the general sense, before enrollment there’s application and if we’re not getting those applications, we’re losing enrollment,” Lee said.