PA News

Pa. mandates masks in K-12 schools

Order to take effect Sept. 7

HARRISBURG (AP) -- Masks will be required in all Pennsylvania public and private schools, as well as child care facilities, Gov. Tom Wolf announced Tuesday, reversing course amid a statewide COVID-19 resurgence that is filling hospital beds just as students return to class.

The Department of Health order will take effect Tuesday, Sept. 7 -- a week or more after the start of school in many districts, but the first day of school for Mifflin County students -- and will require students, teachers and staff to wear masks when inside, regardless of vaccination status, the Wolf administration said.

The order will not apply to student athletes while they're playing, nor to outdoor activities.

"Wearing a mask in school is necessary to keep our children in the classroom and to keep COVID out of that classroom," Wolf said at a news conference Tuesday.

The Pennsylvania School Boards Association said that the decision on masking should have been left to local school officials, but that it would nevertheless remind school districts "of their legal obligation related to the directive."

"Our members remain committed to the health and safety of their students and staff, and while they have welcomed the expertise and guidance of state and federal agencies, they are in the best position to evaluate and promptly respond to the ever-evolving conditions in their own communities," said Nathan Mains, the group's chief executive officer.

The Democratic governor took action after the Republican leaders of the House and Senate rejected his request to pass legislation requiring masks in classrooms. GOP lawmakers acknowledged that coronavirus cases are again surging across the state but insisted that local leaders were best positioned to respond to the pandemic.

"Protecting the health and safety of our children is always a top consideration for lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. However, this is exactly the kind of government overreach voters opposed when they stripped Gov. Wolf of the authority to unilaterally extend emergency declarations in May," Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman (R-Bellefonte) said. "Throughout the summer, Governor Wolf and Acting Health Secretary Beam were adamant about allowing these decisions to be made at the local level based on the best available data. It is completely disingenuous for him to flip-flop now when he didn't like the choices school districts made.

"The timing of this announcement is also extremely problematic. Over the past month, school board meetings were turned into public spectacles with school board directors, parents, teachers and community members lobbing insults and accusations. It is disappointing Governor Wolf stood idly by and allowed our communities to be torn apart by this debate, only to pull the rug out from everyone at the last minute. Our school boards deserve an apology for the governor's dereliction of duty."

Corman said he believes Beam does not have the authority to even implement or enforce mitigation measures on healthy Pennsylvanians.

"If Gov. Wolf truly believed he had this authority, then he would not have asked the General Assembly to implement a mask mandate just last week," Corman said.

State Rep. John Hershey (R-Mifflintown) said the mandate shows disregard for community needs. Hershey also questioned the authority of the executive branch to implement such a mandate, just a week after asking the legislature for a special session on the matter.

"The governor is once again choosing executive overreach instead of trusting school boards to determine what is best for the classrooms in the communities they serve," he said. "The needs of Pennsylvanians in Mifflin, Juniata and Franklin counties differ from those in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Not only have educators had access to COVID-19 vaccines for more than seven months, but those same vaccines are readily available to older children who are learning in the very classrooms where the governor now says they must wear masks.

"Residents of the 82nd District can rest assured I will be joining GOP leadership in the House and Senate in pushing back on this measure," Hershey said.

Rep. Kerry Benninghoff (R-Bellefonte), whose district includes part of Mifflin County, said the Wolf administration has again gone back on its word and deprived communities of local local control and community self-determination in public health decisions.

"Data clearly shows that this virus affects different areas of Pennsylvania in dissimilar ways, which is why local control that reflects on-the-ground realities is imperative. History shows that a one-sized, fits-all approach to public health causes more anxiety and frustration than decisions made at the local level with local input," he said. "Unfortunately, the administration has turned a deaf ear to the people of Pennsylvania who passed two constitutional amendments in May that sent a clear message that things need to work differently in this state. House Republicans stand ready to follow through on that and are already in the process of taking a serious look at potential legislative changes that address this administration's misuse of current law."

Rep. Rich Irvin (R-Huntingdon), who also represents a portion of Mifflin County, echoed the sentiments in favor of local control.

"The governor has been saying all summer that the decision on whether or not schools should have a mask mandate should be left up to the individual school boards. After long hours devising protocols, receiving input from parents and putting plans into action now that kids are back in school, the governor is stepping in and superseding the people in the best position to make that call," he said. "What the governor fails to realize is that Pennsylvania, like most states, has select 'hotspots' of COVID-19 and schools are monitoring their area communities to watch for spikes in cases and will take further action if and when it is needed."

Less than a month ago, Wolf himself had ruled out a statewide mask mandate for schools after requiring them last year. But the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus has changed the administration's calculus about what is needed to keep students in class.

Pennsylvania is now averaging more than 3,200 new, confirmed infections daily -- 20 times the number of cases it was reporting on a typical day in early July. More than 1,700 people are hospitalized with COVID-19, up sevenfold since last month. Deaths have doubled in two weeks to about 20 per day.

Pennsylvania's two statewide teachers unions had urged K-12 schools to require masks in school buildings, citing delta's threat. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends masks in schools for students, staff and teachers.

But masking is a highly contentious issue, and school board meetings have been the scene of heated debate as parents argue for and against.

Last week, a federal judge ordered the North Allegheny School District and its board to require face coverings for students, staff and visitors, siding with a group of parents in the Pittsburgh suburbs who had sued. Likewise, parents of special needs children sued a suburban Philadelphia school board that refused to mandate masks. That case was pending when word of the impending statewide mandate emerged.

Some schools have reimposed mask mandates on their own after starting out the year without them.

The North Schuylkill School District began requiring masks indoors after it was forced to quarantine 60 students. It said only 11 students would have needed to quarantine if masking had been in place.