Malibu Ditches Mask Ban, Waits On In-Person Council Meetings

MALIBU, CA — The Malibu City Council unanimously voted to approve on first reading an ordinance rescinding a November 5 ordinance requiring mask wearing in public, but punted the issue of returning to in-person City Council meetings.

With minimal discussion, the Council voted to approve an ordinance requiring wearing masks in public, in light of California’s new guidance that vaccinated people can travel indoors and outdoors without any face coverings starting Tuesday. The new ordinance will align with state guidelines on workers’ mask wearing, which Gov. Newsom said would change this week to allow vaccinated workers to work without face coverings indoors.

Ordinance 487 will come back to the Council at its June 28 for a second reading and likely adoption.

The Council was less certain on resuming in-person meetings, with or without members of the public present. City Manager Steve McClary recommended that the council refrain from any decision making until the Division of Occupational Safety & Health (Cal/OSHA) revises its regulations Thursday for workplace gatherings, a designation under which the Council and City Hall fall.

Current rules would require councilmembers to wear masks during meetings that often exceed five hours.

McClary said that the council has three options:

• To continue the current setup, at least for a month
• Institute a hybrid model in which members of the public gather in council chambers and participate remotely, which McClary said would be technically challenging but within the city’s capabilities
• To be present in council chambers, but the public participates remotely, which McClary said would violate the Brown Act

Mayor Paul Grisanti and Councilmembers Karen Farrer and Mikke Pierson said they wanted to wait a month to make the decision in anticipation of more definitive rules from the Division of Occupational Safety & Health (Cal/OSHA) on in-person gatherings and vaccine screenings.

Assistant City Attorney Trevor Rusin told councilmembers that it is up to them whether they want to implement some kind of vaccine passport system, which Pierson said he supports.

“Under new guidance out today from the California Department of Public Health...people can require unvaccinated individuals to self-attest upon entry, like you said an honor system, or implement a vaccine verification process that you’d want to look very closely into if that was interesting to the Council, or require people to wear masks,” Rusin said.

Councilmember Bruce Silverstein asked to form an ad hoc committee to determine the best course of action.

“This is such a dynamic situation that changes from week to week - I wonder if we couldn’t create an ad hoc committee that can work with Steve and staff to come back to the council with a game plan rather than constantly come back and have us all discuss what we plan to do,” Silverstein said.

The council agreed to ask city staff to come back with an update for the June 28 meeting, with an agenda item to create the ad hoc committee.