A Pasco councilman is helping to challenge another COVID-related requirement in court — this time it’s masks in schools. Pete Serrano, the general counsel for the Silent Majority Foundation, is representing Tri-City parents challenging the rule letting the state withhold money from school districts that don’t follow the mask requirement. The lawsuit, filed in Franklin County, argues that Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction’s rule violates the constitutional requirement for the state to provide an “amply funded education.”
“This rule is what everyone is up in arms protesting,” Serrano said in a video. “This is the rule that allows Mr. (Chris) Reykdal as the superintendent of public instruction to enforce Jay Inslee’s mask mandate and vaccine mandate.” The state superintendent’s office received the petition for judicial review and is working on a response with the state Attorney General’s Office, said Katy Payne, executive director of communications for OSPI.
The emergency rules have been an important component in keeping schools open, she told the Herald. “With our health and safety requirements in place, our students experienced minimal disruptions in their learning this winter even as community case counts spiked due to the omicron variant,” she said. “Public health experts are predicting cases will fall to much lower levels within the next few weeks, and we anticipate action will soon be taken around the statewide mask requirement for schools,” she said. In a news release last week, Reykdal recommended letting local health districts and school boards make the decision about whether masks should be required in schools. He suggested changing the state’s guidance in coming weeks. The governor has not set a date for lifting the indoor mask requirement.
MASK PROTESTS
The mask requirement has been a central focus of protests and parents coming to recent Tri-Cities school board meetings. Many of the parents at the meetings say the masks hurt their children’s mental health and their ability to learn. They also point out that other states have already started to end the requirement, and children are at a lower risk of dying from the disease. The four groups of Tri-City parents suing the state said the pandemic has left their children with suicidal thoughts among other stress. They also said their children have not been able to get an education because they aren’t allowed to go to school without a mask.
In response, Tri-City school districts have said they risk losing state and federal funding if they don’t follow the requirement. The new lawsuit is Serrano’s latest effort to challenge rules around COVID. He organized a lawsuit aimed at stopping a COVID vaccine requirement at Hanford. There hasn’t been a decision in that case.
Rochelle Wilcox, parent of an Enterprise Middle School student protesting the school mask mandate, explains why several parents have been supporting the group of about 50 students by standing outside of the West Richland school. BY BOB BRAWDY
The parents are challenging a series of codes put in place with a Dec. 31, 2021, rule that enforced Inslee’s proclamation concerning the COVID-19 response. As part of the proclamation, schools are required to follow rules set by the Department of Health, the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction and the Department of Labor & Industries. Among those rules, is the requirement that all staff and students wear face coverings and masks regardless of vaccination status. Public health officials have said that masks are part of a larger group of precautions that keep schools from increasing the risk to the communities they serve. The set of administrative codes put into place say the state will send a 15-day notice if a district doesn’t follow the rules laid out by the state. The rules requires a resolution from the “local education agency” that “rescinds any actions” that violate the proclamation.
If they don’t rescind the action, a second notice will be sent out with a five-day deadline to comply. If they don’t meet that deadline, the state superintendent may withhold the agency’s next monthly apportionment of revenue.
STOP ENFORCEMENT
Serrano is looking for the court to step in to stop the enforcement of the rule and to find that the rules are invalid. He pointed out that the state constitution says that the right to a fully funded education is paramount. He said each of the children involved in the lawsuit has been “directly impacted by mask mandates and the threat of withholding constitutionally required funds,” according to the lawsuit.
He argued the state can’t eliminate any part of basic education unless it relates to educational policy. “(The) state must show that a program once considered central to basic education no longer serves the same educational purpose or should be replaced with a superior program or offering,” the complaint said. He also argued that Reykdal isn’t allowed to enforce Inslee’s proclamation. In his video message, Serrano said the power to lift the requirement is completely in Reykdal’s hands. “Until he says, ‘I’m vacating my rule,’ we don’t believe he’s going to do anything to remove the mask mandate. So the only way to fight this is in court,” Serrano said.
This story was originally published February 16, 2022 5:00 AM.
