The issue of masks dominated September’s meeting of the King William County School Board, a meeting that went into recess because some members of the audience refused to wear masks.
The board closed down the meeting for about 10 minutes because approximately 10 people in the audience refused to comply with the order to wear masks. The meeting Sept. 21 resumed when they complied.
In August, the School Board decided to challenge the mask requirement issued by Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam as students returned to schools.
The board voted 4-1 to send a letter to state leaders at a special meeting Aug. 24. The letter says Senate Bill 1303 passed by the Virginia General Assembly and signed into law by Northam is unconstitutional. It made its request to the state board of health’s Sept. 2 meeting.
The School Board has also agreed to consider exemptions to the mask rule for people who hold strongly held religious beliefs along with medical exemptions.
It’s not clear if any exemptions have been granted. Schools Superintendent David White confirmed in an email that the issue was discussed in closed session Sept. 21.
“All decisions regarding religious and/or medical exemptions were discussed in closed session, therefore I cannot discuss the details,” White said.
School Board chairman Steven Tupponce, who led the move to challenge the state’s mask mandate, said the outcome of the board’s letter to the state board of health’s Sept. 2 meeting remains unknown.
Tupponce said the board had not received a response from Northam by the time of the meeting.
He said the minutes of the Virginia Board of Health Sept. 2 meeting have yet to be released. Tupponce said he questioned Joe Hilbert, deputy commissioner for governmental and regulatory affairs at the department.
“He relayed that the commissioner only informed the board that he had issued the order but the board did not take any action in either affirming it or rescinding it,” Tupponce said.
Tupponce said he questioned Hilbert about the legality of the order.
“We were getting nowhere so I asked him politely to send me the minutes,” he said.
The letter sent by King William County School Board challenged the legality of the mask mandate in state schools.
“We reject the basis of a health order that only applies to the K-12 setting and urge the board to consider whether it is appropriate that a public health emergency impacts only K-12 school settings, as opposed to all indoor public settings. The declaration of an emergency and the resulting mask mandate for only one setting is not a consistent action for a genuine health emergency,” the letter stated.
The mask issue dominated an often angry public comments section of the meeting.
Tupponce reminded members of the audience of the mask requirement for all people ages 2 or older regardless of vaccination status.
“The King William County School Board will require everyone attending the School Board meeting to wear a mask properly,” he said.
He urged people not wearing masks to watch the meeting via YouTube or Zoom. When some members of the audience refused to comply with the order, the meeting went back into recess.
When the meeting resumed, Tupponce said the School Board is in a difficult position and is obligated to comply with the public health order, despite personal objections to the order.
Some members of the public attacked the School Board for complying with the mask mandate. One parent branded the mask mandate as child abuse and crimes against humanity. Another speaker compared officials who comply with the mandate to Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg trials for “following orders.”
The state’s mask order contains medical and religious exemptions. In an FAQ statement issued Aug. 31, the office of the State Health Commissioner said the order “includes an exception for when necessary to participate in a religious ritual. In addition, an individual with a sincerely held religious objection to wearing a mask in school may request a reasonable accommodation.”
Another member of the public, Patience Brown, raised a concern over a bus driver used during the summer program. She claimed the driver sexually harassed three students. Brown claimed the driver was terminated by a neighboring county before being employed by King William County.
White said in an email the bus driver is no longer employed by King William County. “Because it was a personnel issue, I cannot disclose any of the details. However, we were not aware of him having been previously fired and cannot confirm the parent’s assertions,” White said.
David Macaulay, davidmacaulayva@gmail.com
