Governor Tony Evers won’t be issuing any general school closure orders, after a swathe of districts have had cases of COVID-19.
Evers says that local school districts continue to be the best source for their own decisions on whether or not to reopen.
“They are the experts on what resources they have locally. The ability to open safely is one that is a local decision.”
Evers says sending out a blanket order at this point would be confusing.
“If you’re in a very small District where you have already small class sizes it’s much easier to provide social distancing for students than it is than in school districts where you don’t have that ability.”
The state has been providing guidelines to districts since before the start of the school year.
The governor is also still mulling whether or not he’ll be extending the statewide masking order. Evers says that repeated legal action has hampered the state’s ability to combat COVID-19.
“We’re severely limited as to what we can do and now we’re seeing that even counties are severely limited to what they can do.”
He says he’d like to work with the Republican controlled legislature on the issue.
“The legislature seems reluctant to accomplish anything as it relates to restrictions so to put it bluntly we’re going to continue to do what we can do and masking is one of them and we have that until the 28th of this month.”
Evers first formal efforts to control COVID-19 through a public health order were struck down by the State Supreme Court, which ordered the Governor and the Legislature to work out a plan to handle the virus.
Republicans have not put forward their own plans on the issue.
