PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The two top ranking Republicans in the Pennsylvania State Legislature have told Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf they are not going to come back to Harrisburg early to discuss a mask mandate in schools and child care centers.
In a letter hand-delivered to Wolf (which you can read below), State House Speaker Ryan Cutler, R-Lancaster, and State Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman, R-Centre, pointed out that the Wolf administration has said for months they had no plans to issue any mandates.
Instead, Wolf was leaving decisions like masking up to school districts or municipalities at that time.
Corman and Cutler called his request for the legislature to take up the issue a “stark departure from that position.”
The two Republicans say they believe the current approach remains the best path forward.
They believe the most effective way to fight the virus “is to continue to urge those who can get vaccinated to do so in the interest of their own health, and the health of their neighbors and community members.”
Corman and Cutler said it’s their understanding the overwhelming majority of people being hospitalized are unvaccinated, and therefore should already be wearing masks.
They are calling on the Wolf administration to improve their data reporting to show how many new cases are people who got the vaccine, and how many are people who are unvaccinated.
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In the governor's letter to Corman and Cutler, he offered worry about the increase in COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths with school about to start.
When Wolf stated his belief on August 6 that municipalities and school districts should decide on mask mandates, the seven-day average of new COVID-19 cases in Pennsylvania was 1,364.
That amount has now more than doubled in 19 days, with a seven-day average of 2,863 in the state as of August 25, and a one-day total Wednesday of 4,094.
The governor shared a statement which you can read in full below.
Given the rising case count in Pennsylvania and around the country and the legislature’s desire to be included in emergency response, we thought it was prudent to reach out to try to work with them to keep kids safe and in school. The governor is disappointed that Republican leadership does not want to come back to session, but quick action is often what is needed during times of emergency when conditions change. It is critical that we do everything we can to ensure that our kids remain in school full time in person, so parents can remain in the workforce and our students can get the best education.
As the administration is sure that the legislature is aware, no vaccine has been approved for children under 12. In Pennsylvania, 18.2 percent of children from 10-14 are fully vaccinated and 38.3 percent of children 15-19 are fully vaccinated. In many counties where mask mandates are not in place for schools, those numbers are even lower. All of this information is readily available on the Department of Health’s data dashboards. Since July when schools first began discussing health and safety plans, Pennsylvania’s COVID-19 caseload has increased from less than 300 a day to more than 3,000 a day.
We agree that decisions are best left to local leaders, but we are increasingly concerned that Republican members are interfering with these decisions and threatening school boards either implicitly or explicitly.
The administration is hopeful the general assembly will reconsider returning to Harrisburg quickly to help respond to this emergency.
Tim Jimenez, Jay Sorgi and the Associated Press contributed to this report.