LARNED — Pawnee County commissioners blocked off an hour of their Monday morning meeting to discuss the county’s response to Governor Laura Kelly’s Executive Order 20-59 concerning COVID-19 related mitigation procedures in schools. The order, which goes into effect Aug. 10, is the subject of a controversial argument between the Governor Kelly’s office and the State Attorney General Derek Schmidt over whether or not counties can opt to rescind, according to Pawnee County Attorney Doug McNett, who advised the commissioners his opinion falls in line with Schmidt’s.
The order includes four requirements schools must adhere to in order to reopen this fall. They include mandatory mask wearing in all K-12 schools by all students, faculty, staff, vendors and other visitors (with some health related exceptions), daily temperature checks by any person entering the school building for the first time that day, availability of hand sanitizer and hand washing stations, and adherence to social distancing of at least 6 feet (with allowances made for transitions or special infrequent circumstances).
Pawnee County Commissioner Bob Rein Jr. stated the commissioners believe the authority to mandate how schools will reopen should be dictated by individual school boards, not a one-size-fits-all mandate from the state. A draft public health order was distributed among those in attendance for review. It cited K.S.A. 48-925(h), which says the Board of County Commissioner may issue an order relating to public health with provisions that are less stringent than those in the governor’s order. It also indicated that the “Pawnee County Local Health Officer” was consulted and implementation of all provisions in the order are not necessary to protect the public health and safety of students, teachers and others of Pawnee County at this time and that each district shall make its own rules. But, it also included the order that “All school districts in Pawnee County are recommended to adopt and utilize, at a minimum, the guidelines set forth in the “Operations” section of “Navigating Change — Kansas’ Guide to Learning and School Safety Operations,” issued by the Kansas State Department of Education.
Also at the meeting were McNett, Fort Larned USD 495 Superintendent Bryce Wachs, USD 495 School Board President Charles “Bud” Tabler, Pawnee County Health Department Director Cheryl Hoberecht, Pawnee County Sheriff Scott King and a USD 495 parent. Wachs told the commissioners that in order to avoid liability, his and other school districts are being advised by legal counsel to consider orders that “recommend” or “strongly recommend” certain courses of action to treat those recommendations as requirements. He said he felt the county’s order simply “passed the buck” to the health department. Districts are advised to follow the advice of the local health officer.
“Schools can only have a modified quarantine order if there is approval from the local health officer,” Wachs said.
Rein responded that he and the other commissioners have no intention of passing the buck, and that after consulting with members of the local school boards, they indicated they would prefer to make the decisions.
Tabler spoke up. He stated the USD 495 Board of Education had met that morning and decided they needed to follow recommendations because they wanted to avoid liability. He said no one wants to be perceived as not willing to take the advice of their health officer. He agreed, he said, even though he believes teaching will be difficult with masks. Board members feel starting school with strict rules in place will allow them to slowly reduce restrictions later, which is preferable to having to ramp them up later, he said.
Commissioner Phil Hammeke suggested rather than making a recommendation, the county could simply rescind the order, and then follow the advice of the local health department.
Rein asked Hoberecht to give an update on the scope of cases in the county. She stated that Pawnee County has had a total of nine positive cases this year, and currently only had one active case, though she expected to report one additional case later that day. She reported the risk of community exposure from that one case is low. There have been no deaths in the county, and all other cases have recovered.
“Right now we don’t have a big case count,” she said. “This could change next week.”
She added that, while it is controversial, there is enough proof that masks stop the spread of the virus.
“We are willing to follow whatever the recommendation is from the local health department,” Wachs said. “If she recommends “Navigating Change,” fine. If she recommends something different, that’s okay.”
Discussion turned to how Hoberecht could gauge the level of risk of community spread in the county on a weekly basis, and how that information could be reported to commissioners and the school districts. The discussion was then tabled until the following week. The commission will take up the discussion again at 11:30 a.m. on Monday, Aug. 10 in its chamber.
The sole USD 495 parent present thanked the commissioners, the school district and the health department for the time and effort they were putting into the decision.
The 32-page document,“Navigating Change — Kansas’ Guide to Learning and School Safety Operations” published by the Kansas State Board of Education can be found at the KSDE website
(https://www.ksde.org/Portals/0/Communications/Navigating%20Change/Operations.pdf).
