On Aug 27, the Benzie-Leelanau District Health Department and the Northwest Michigan Health Department released a mask mandate for all K-12 schools within each department.
Masks would be required for everyone, regardless of the schools’ original plans that were in place.
“Our goal is to keep our kids safe and healthy,” said Health Officer Lisa Peacock for both health departments. “Our local medical professionals, our state and national authorities, everyone has agreed there’s overwhelming medical evidence that it is a protective measure that’s necessary as we start the school year given the current circumstances.”
The Benzie County Commissioners held a meeting on Sept 1 for the public to express their opinions on the mandate, and the way the mandate was announced.
“Our school board meeting on Monday was attended really well by the community of our district,” said Board of Education President Brian Childs. “I wanted to get a broader picture of how more of the community felt.”
Childs said the school board didn’t receive any forewarning from the Benzie-Leelanau District Health Department.
“When someone mandates something that makes us have to create a policy, without giving us any information that we need as a board to make this policy, I have issues with that,” he said.
That sentiment was echoed by several Benzie Commissioner members, who thought that the health department was overstepping on their schools’ right to choose.
Commissioners in Otsego, Antrim, Charlevoix, and Emmet counties felt the same way, and are asking the Northwest Michigan Health Department to reconsider the mandate.
The four commissioners: Robert T. Pallarito from Otsego County, Dave Bachelor from Emmet County, Jarris Rubingh from Antrim County, and Scott Hankins from Charlevoix County are all on the Northwest Michigan Health Department Health Board, as well.
“I kind of felt betrayed. We are on the board of health, we were not consulted,” said Pallarito. “The letter indicated that the chairwoman was contacted, she did not contact any of the other board members.”
They drafted, and sent a letter, to the health department stating their concerns, and asked that they repeal their decision until the board’s formal meeting on Sept 7.
“This is not even about Covid, vaccines, or masks, it’s about an overreach by a department of government that’s supposed to be overseen by elected officials who have gone out of their way to go around elected officials and the board of educations,” said Pallarito.
Pallarito said this mandate is not fair to the school districts who have already made a plan on masking in school.
“The Gaylord schools put forward three options that were just incredible,” he said. “To have the health department step all over them and deem it unqualified, that the parents and teachers did not come up with a good plan, was unreasonable.”
Peacock did not change her position when asked about the letter.
“I feel that this order is necessary to make sure that we implement a proven protective safety measure as supported by overwhelming medical evidence,” she said. “Nothing has happened that has changed my feeling about that.”
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