Most Lancaster County schools are ditching the mask mandate amid chaotic court battle

Most county school districts have decided to make masks optional instead of waiting for resolution of a court battle over whether the state’s school mask order - which mandates students, employees and visitors wear masks inside school buildings - is valid.

The state Department of Health, however, says nothing has changed. Schools, department spokesperson Paul O’Neill told LNP | LancasterOnline Wednesday, should follow the mask mandate until Dec. 4 - when the order is expected to be thrown out, again, by the Commonwealth Court - and possibly even longer.

“Given the Commonwealth Court ruling, we will seek to ensure that the masking mandate remains in place through the duration of the appeal process in our ongoing effort to protect the health and safety of students, teachers and staff,” O’Neill said.

Asked how the mandate would remain in place after Dec. 4, whether it’s through another appeal or perhaps a separate emergency regulation, O’Neill said, “Right now, our focus is on continuing to protect public health and safety and we're waiting on feedback from the (state) Supreme Court.”

Nov. 8, Gov. Tom Wolf announced the mask order for K-12 schools would expire Jan. 17, 2022. Two days later, the Commonwealth Court sided with a legal challenge to the masking order, declaring it unlawful and, therefore, unenforceable. Within hours of that decision, myriad Lancaster County schools that had mask-optional policies in place prior to the order taking effect in September announced they would no longer require masks

That same day, however, state Acting Health Secretary Alison Beam then appealed the lower court’s decision, triggering a stay of the order, meaning it was once again valid. Only a few county school districts that shifted back to mask-optional after the initial Commonwealth Court decision announced they would be following the order again.

Last Thursday, a request was filed with the Commonwealth Court to lift the stay until the state Supreme Court decides whether to hear the appeal. Late Tuesday, the court granted that request and said the order must expire Dec. 4, a Saturday.

As of now, only three school districts - Columbia Borough, Manheim Township and School District of Lancaster - appear to be sticking with a mask requirement, even after Dec. 4.

Octorara Area, which straddles both Lancaster and Chester counties, has not decided whether it will require masks past Dec. 4, Superintendent Michele Orner, said.

The other 13 county school districts are either currently mask-optional or will revert to mask-optional after Dec. 4. ‘Expect the unexpected’

Warwick Superintendent April Hershey told LNP | LancasterOnline Wednesday that the past week and a half has been a mirror of what schools have endured the last 18 months: “Expect the unexpected,” she said.

Warwick is one of the districts that held a school board meeting this week and discussed whether to keep masks optional or keep switching back and forth depending on what the courts decide. The board decided to keep masks optional.

Hershey said the administration and school board are focused most on uniting the community, keeping schools open, educating students and keeping students and employees healthy.

“We just want to be in the business of doing what’s best for kids,” she said.

The Cocalico school board also moved to make masks optional, regardless of what the courts decide. In a letter to families Monday, school board President Rev. Kevin Eshleman said that depending on what happens in the courts, the mask mandate could change several times before it is anticipated to be lifted in January.

“We hope the School Board’s decision regarding optional masks during this uncertain time will help us maintain a stable school environment that is focused on learning and academics,” Eshleman said, thanking the community for its understanding “yet again.”

Penn Manor’s school board president also urged consistency in remarks before his board voted to make masks optional this week.

“Due to the rapidly changing nature of the legal proceedings, the Board presently considers the current mask mandate to be unenforceable for our administration and faculty without severely impacting our learning environment,” school board President Herk Rintz said, adding that the recent mask rulings have taken the focus off learning.

Conestoga Valley is one of the school districts following the most recent court ruling to Dec. 4, when it will make masks optional. In remarks during this week’s school board meeting, district Superintendent Dave Zuilkoski expressed how he, like everyone else, is tired of COVID-19 as well as the lack of civility displayed at board meetings and the ever-changing mandates and guidance from the state.

“While there are many opinions out there, the legal facts are that the stay mandates continued implementation of the order,” he said.

lengthy, but interesting:

18 Nov: Weltwoche Magazine, Switzerland: Matt Ridley: Ground Zero of the Pandemic
A newly-published book presents circumstantial evidence that suggests the COVID-19 virus originated in a laboratory. Lab leaks are far more frequent than commonly thought, says co-author Matt Ridley. In this interview with Die Weltwoche he talks about hazardous research conducted in China and explains why the truth about the origin of the virus is of paramount importance for mankind.
by Urs Gehriger
Matt Ridley and Alina Chan have painstakingly collected circumstantial evidence to track down ground zero of the pandemic. In their book, “Viral: The Search for the Origin of COVID-19” (LINK) published on Monday they remind readers that the focus has fundamentally shifted in recent months. “The lab leak hypothesis transformed from a conspiracy theory to just barely a possibility to a plausible hypothesis worthy of a credible investigation.” And they add, “We now think it very possible that the pandemic did result from the work of scientists either when collecting samples in the field or when working with those samples in a laboratory.”...

Weltwoche: Critics have pointed out that the coronavirus RaTG13 from the Mojiang mine shared 96% of its genome with Sars-CoV-2, so it is not related closely enough to SARS-CoV-2. The 4% genetic divergence between RaTG13 and Sars-CoV-2 is equivalent to 40 years of evolutionary change.

Ridley: Just in September, another virus was discovered by a French scientist working in Laos, which is slightly more closely related to the SARS-CoV-2 virus than the Mojiang one. That’s interesting because it seems to imply a potential origin outside China.

However, it has now emerged, just in the last weeks, that the Eco Health Alliance was collecting viruses in other countries in Southeast Asia, including Laos, and was analyzing those viruses not in the country where they were collected, not in America, but in Wuhan in China. In other words, it was sending viruses from Laos to Wuhan.

We again have a situation where we’ve found an even closer relative (to SARS-CoV-2), but the only known link we have between that country and Wuhan with respect to bat-borne viruses is that we know scientists were taking them from Laos to Wuhan. Even that discovery raises very serious questions about the involvement of a laboratory. That is not good practice. If you’re going to collect viruses in one country and transport them to another and analyze them in a city of 11 million people, you are not thinking carefully about the risks you are running...
https://www.weltwoche.ch/ausgaben/2021-46/weltwoche-international/wi-ground-zero-of-the-pandemic-die-weltwoche-ausgabe-46-2021.html

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