A former municipal employee in Chatham-Kent is appealing a Superior Court decision to uphold her termination by the municipality for not getting vaccinated during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Suzanne Krysac was fired in 2022 after 17 years at the municipality for refusing to get vaccinated. She cited her religious beliefs for her refusal.
Krysac is now seeking $252,000 in severance pay, damages, and mental distress caused by "the manner in which she was fired."
In a notice of appeal, her lawyer claims the court made a mistake in concluding that Krysac was not wrongfully terminated from her employment due to religious discrimination.
"The lower court found that the evidence establishes that the plaintiff articulated her faith in a consistent and sincere manner, and that her opposition to testing was firmly rooted in her religious beliefs, a finding evincing satisfaction of the full Amselem criteria, yet errantly concluded religious discrimination did not occur when the defendant terminated the Appellant’s employment rather than seeking accommodation solutions," wrote defence lawyer James Kitchen.
Kitchen also said that Krysac's employment was terminated months after federal and provincial government employment vaccine mandates had already been rescinded.
The municipality told CK News Today it has received notice of the Plaintiff’s appeal of the lower court’s ruling, and the appeal process is still in its early stages.
"The Municipality believes that the lower court’s decision was the appropriate outcome. The Municipality is responding to the appeal and remains committed to seeing the decision upheld," said Emily Crawford, Chatham-Kent Director of Legal Services.
The municipality previously testified that no viable accommodation options were available to Krysac, other than termination.
It noted that abstaining from COVID-19 testing is not a practice recognized by the Christian faith, and allowing Krysac back to work unvaccinated would've put her colleagues at risk of infection.
The court also previously summarized that certain essential duties had to be reassigned to other employees who were physically present in the workplace, and termination was the only reasonable course of action available.
"The fact that she may have performed relatively well from home for approximately eight months does not mean that this was a 'sustainable' arrangement on an indefinite basis," Justice Brian Dube wrote in his ruling.
No date for the court appeal has been set yet.
