There’s a bit of a brouhaha here in Illinois about students wearing facemasks in schools. Jessica D’Onofrio reports at WGN News:
CHICAGO (WLS) — An Illinois judge’s ruling has forced many schools Monday to decide whether to continue with a mask mandate or to make them optional.
Some school districts plan to keep their mask rules in place, while others made them optional.
Last Friday, a judge in Sangamon County ruled against Governor JB Pritzker’s mask mandate inside school building, in response to lawsuits involving parents and teachers from more than 150 districts.
“Now is not the time from my perspective to be reducing our mitigation strategies,” said Tony Sanders, superintendent of Elgin School District U-46.
While Governor Pritzker has vowed to appeal, many districts are not waiting for the legal wrangling to be over. Chicago Public Schools said it will continue to require masks, as will U-46 in Elgin.
The state’s second largest school district will have an exemption for a handful of students whose parents were part of the lawsuit, but that’s it.
“Based on the wording of the temporary restraining order we believe we still have the authority to enforce mask wearing as part of our local mitigation efforts, and again, the local bargaining agreements that we have that compel us to provide a safe environment for our employees to work,” Superintendent Sanders said.
Many others have moved swiftly to lift the mask mandate. Some said they will continue to strongly encourage their use, others that these are decisions that should be made at home, like the Superintendent of Timothy Christian Schools in Elmhurst.
“We have wide spaces (and) large classrooms. We believe we can achieve this,” said Matt Davidson, superintendent for Timothy Christian Schools. “We’re seeing it in so many places, tens of thousands of schools across the country, have been mask optional all year long.”
My view is that while I don’t have a problem with the mandates as such I do not believe that Gov. Pritzker has the authority to issue them and he has been remiss in neither operating within the law nor seeking authorization from the legislature to do what he believes is necessary which he would certainly receive. It’s both what you do and how you do it that makes for authoritarian government.
I read the court order over the weekend and my take-aways are:
1. The Governor did not have authority to order schools to implement testing, mask and vaccine rules through the Illinois State Board of Education. The legislature delegated any such emergency public health authority to the Illinois Department of Public Health. The Department could not by emergency rule delegate that responsibility to a different agency. (In other words, if Congress delegates a responsibility to the Department of Justice, DOJ can’t re-delegate it to the Department of Defense)
2. Had the Department of Public Health acted, the relevant statute would require either individual consent or a court order following an evidentiary hearing to any individual objecting to any public health restrictions. The Governor’s approach of treating this as an educational issue was intended to avoid the accompanying judicial oversight role required by the legislature.
3. Individual school districts can enact policies, but these must be coordinated with the Department of Public Health and subject to public meeting and comment requirements. It also seems like “close contact” exclusions have to be made by the local health department, but I am unsure. A lot of schools followed the emergency rules under threat of losing funding and credentials. Teachers and staff were fired under its cover, and may need to be reinstated.
The Judge was designated by the Illinois Supreme Court to handle all challenges to state emergency rules stemming from the pandemic. She previously upheld the Governor’s ability to continuously extend the emergency powers he has for 30 days, and he has probably won every case before her until now. They will certainly appeal, but I would bet it is mostly upheld at the Appellate Court at least.
By the way Dave, you don’t have to comply with any mandates if you are a Democrat, at least if you are at one of their fund raisers.
https://capitolfax.com/2022/02/07/question-of-the-day-3391/
And people wonder why trust in government in the U. S. is so low.
“…you don’t have to comply with any mandates if you are a Democrat,…”
Down here the estimable Stacey Abrams’ face, sans mask, is all over the place……………….as she sits with masked school kids.
There is definitely a two- tier set of rules in this country – one flexible set for the elites of both parties, and another stricter set for workers and the general populace. There is a boiling point of resentment, however, brewing when the hypocrisy of these elites becomes too obvious to rationalize away.
For instance, there is the photograph of Obama assessing the construction of his Hawaiian mansion – maskless, frowning, while surrounded by masked workers. As a supposed environmentalist and climate change advocate, he has two lavish seaside residents, and is trying to keep a sea wall intact, even amidst neighbor’s objections that it’s eroding their beaches.
Report was that they had to be vaccinated to attend and masks off only to eat or for photos. At this point that sounds OK to me. That said they probably should avoid the pictures because people will use that as an excuse to not wear masks when they should.
Steve