Good news from Kentucky!
As you may know, Kentucky Republicans used their legislative supermajority to significantly limit the emergency public health powers of the state’s Governor and Executive Branch. They didn’t advance any real plan of their own (beyond — I’m not kidding — PSAs and free pizza), but they specifically put an end to both the Governor’s Executive Order mandating masks in all public schools (which was limited to 30 days by GOP-enacted legislation) AND the Kentucky Board of Education’s emergency administrative regulation doing the same (which would have lasted for up to 280 days).
So, as of tomorrow (Friday 9/17), there will be no statewide mask mandate for Kentucky public schools, and there will be no significant statewide mandates for schools in the future. Republicans insisted that only local school authorities should make these kind of decisions, and the Freedumb Fringe spent days frothing about the ‘tyranny’ and ‘fascism’ of mask mandates.
Well, in the words of Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan, common sense has broken out. A supermajority of Kentucky’s public school boards have shouldered their responsibility and stepped into the vacuum created by the Republicans’ inability to...well, you know...actually govern.
The Kentucky School Board Association reports, via Twitter, that, as of Wednesday evening, 76% of Kentucky school districts have announced that they will continue to require masks of all students, staff, and visitors after the statewide mandate expires on Friday. Those 130 public school districts are home to 85% of Kentucky’s primary and secondary school students. Given that many of these counties went for Trump by a margin of 70%-30% or more in 2020, I’d call that a pretty strong rebuke of Republican rhetoric about masks in schools.
Only one school district, Science Hill Independent Schools in Pulaski County, has announced that masks will be optional; their superintendent named the Governor a “liberal lunatic” when the statewide mandate was issued, so there was little surprise in that particular announcement.
Science Hill does, however, illustrate a flaw in Republicans’ “local control” logic. As you can see in the map above, Pulaski County is home to three school districts; Pulaski County Schools is requiring masks, Science Hill Independent Schools is going mask-optional and Somerset Independent Schools has not yet made an announcement. Those kids will be mixing and mingling all over the county (think malls, playgrounds, athletic events, churches) and then going back to a mix of mask/no-mask school environments. That would seem to set the stage for even more community spread. There are quite a few Kentucky counties in which one of the local school districts has not yet made its decision; one would hope that they present a unified approach for the students of their counties, but we’ll have to wait and see.
Some districts are implementing tiered requirements based upon the prevalence of COVID in their community — such as “masks optional when we get out of the red or orange zone” — but a quick look at the current statewide incidence map suggests that they’ll be masked for some time yet:
All in all, I’d say that Kentucky’s school boards are ON IT.
Thursday, Sep 16, 2021 · 6:09:13 PM +00:00 · wesmorgan1
UPDATE: As of noon today (16 Sep), the numbers are:
- 138 districts have issued mask mandates
- 3 districts will make masks optional (Science Hill Independent Schools, Gallatin County Schools, and Burgin Independent Schools)
- 30 districts have yet to announce a policy
So, 81% of the state’s 171 school districts are requiring masks!