IN RE: Brian VIGNALI (2023)

Order and judgment (one paper), Supreme Court, New York County (Sabrina Kraus, J.), entered on or about April 25, 2023, which denied the petition to annul the determination of City of New York Reasonable Accommodation Appeals Panel, dated October 26, 2022, denying petitioner's request for a religious exemption from the COVID–19 vaccination requirement for employees of respondent The City of New York, granted respondents’ cross-motion to dismiss the petition, and dismissed the proceeding brought pursuant to CPLR article 78, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

We reject as moot petitioner's challenge to the denial of his request for a religious exemption to the vaccination mandate, given that the requirement for City employees to be excluded from their workplaces if they failed to submit proof of compliance with the mandate has been repealed and was never enforced against petitioner (see e.g. Matter of New York State Constr. Safety Assn. v. New York City Dept. of Health & Mental Hygiene, 205 A.D.3d 576, 577, 166 N.Y.S.3d 854 [1st Dept. 2022];  People v. Amazon.com., 205 A.D.3d 485, 487, 169 N.Y.S.3d 27 [1st Dept. 2022]).  The possibility that some form of vaccine mandate might be enforced at some unknown time in the future does not provide a basis for the proceeding to escape the mootness doctrine, and the likelihood of such a mandate is, in any event, speculative (see e.g. Matter of Only Props. LLC v. New York City Dept. of Bldgs., 211 A.D.3d 541, 541, 181 N.Y.S.3d 38 [1st Dept. 2022];  Encore Coll. Bookstores, Inc. v. City Univ. of N.Y., 75 A.D.3d 442, 442, 905 N.Y.S.2d 573 [1st Dept. 2010]).

Furthermore, the “narrow exception” to the mootness doctrine — that is, the exception that gives us the discretion to review a case if the controversy or issue involved is likely to recur, typically evades review, and raises a substantial and novel question — does not apply here (see Wisholek v. Douglas, 97 N.Y.2d 740, 742, 743 N.Y.S.2d 51, 769 N.E.2d 808 [2002];  Matter of Santiago v. Berlin, 111 A.D.3d 487, 487, 974 N.Y.S.2d 457 [1st Dept. 2013]).  Petitioner does not raise issues so likely to evade review as to justify departing from the standard rules governing mootness (Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce, Inc. v. Pataki, 100 N.Y.2d 801, 811, 766 N.Y.S.2d 654, 798 N.E.2d 1047 [2003], cert denied 540 U.S. 1017, 124 S.Ct. 570, 157 L.Ed.2d 430 [2003]), nor does he raise novel questions (Wisholek, 97 N.Y.2d at 742, 743 N.Y.S.2d 51, 769 N.E.2d 808;  Matter of Marsteller v. City of New York, 217 A.D.3d 543, 544, 192 N.Y.S.3d 18 [1st Dept. 2023]).