ST PAUL, Minn — The St. Paul Public School district board is reconvening Tuesday with mask mandates for students, staff and faculty front and center on the agenda.
This meeting comes after last month's decision by the board to keep the mask mandate in place, citing a rise of COVID-19 cases in Ramsey County. During that meeting the board voted against removing the mask mandate by a 3-2 margin.
Some members of the board said their vote to keep the mandate was based on transmission rates of the virus in the district. Those who opposed said all physical and mental health challenges need to be accounted for when making decisions like this.
"What I'm reflecting on is our ability to balance multiple community needs for physical health, for mental health, social well-being and what that looks like in our community, I hope we are all mindful of the complexity of this." Said Vice Chair Jessica Kopp
As of Jan. 13, 2022 the CDC was still recommending universal mask-wearing in all K-12 schools regardless of vaccination status. Ramsey county is experiencing 47 new cases a day, on average. So far in April the SPPS school district has had 73 positive COVID cases.
Tuesday's SPPS board meeting will begin at 4:30 p.m. and the vote on the masking guidelines will happen at approximately 5:15 p.m.
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