Beginning Monday, students, staff and visitors will no longer be required to wear masks inside St. Paul public schools. It’s the first time in more than two years that masks will not be required in the schools.
The St. Paul Public School Board voted 6-1 Tuesday in favor of repealing the system’s mask mandate as long as the risk of in-school spread remained low.
It was a change from last month’s board meeting in which board members voted 3-2, with two board members absent, to keep the mandate in place despite St. Paul Public Schools Superintendent Joe Gothard’s recommendation to drop it. The final vote on Tuesday was met by cheers from a crowd of about 50 people who caused disruptions throughout the meeting.
The district will still encourage mask wearing but will not require it. The board also struck down a pair of amendments proposed by board member Uriah Ward. Ward proposed a requirement that staff continue to wear masks while teaching homebound students. Ward also tried to change the risk level in which a mandate would return. Under the newly passed resolution, masking would return when a CDC county risk level is high. Ward proposed the requirement to return when the risk level reached medium. Both measures failed by a vote of 4-3.
St. Paul is the first of the Twin Cities school systems to adopt the change. Minneapolis public schools has yet to remove its mask mandate and is now just one of 20 of the nation’s 500 largest districts that still has mask requirements.