FORT LAUDERDALE, FLA. (WSVN) - The governor’s office is acknowledging that the state cannot withhold the pay for school officials who issue mask mandates despite the governor’s executive order.
On Monday, Gov. Ron DeSantis had indicated that Florida could move to withhold the salaries of superintendents and school board officials who implement mask mandates in their school districts.
However, the governor’s office said Friday that the state cannot withhold school officials’ salaries directly.
In a statement to 7News, a spokesperson for the governor’s office said that the state could “withhold an amount of funding from the district that is equal to the salaries of the superintendent and school board members. As you know, those officials are not on the state payroll, so this form of penalty is the most narrowly tailored approach that the state can take.”
The state is instead calling on officials who issue the mandates to “own their decisions.”
“Governor DeSantis and Commissioner Corcoran have been very clear that the entire school district community shouldn’t suffer just because a few activist, anti-science school board members want to impose overreaching mandates on every student,” the statement said. “Those officials who infringe upon that right should own their decisions – and that means owning the consequences of their decisions, rather than demanding students, teachers, and school staff to foot the bill for their political grandstanding.”
“Because the state can only withhold funding in the exact amount of the salaries in question, some Democrats have suggested that those local officials who violate the law should divert funding from other needs in their district, in order to pay themselves their own salaries. We don’t feel that would be fair to the students, teachers, and school staff, who had no part in breaking the law.”
Despite the governor’s executive order banning school districts from implementing mask mandates, several counties, including Broward County, have defied the order and implemented a mask mandate for students.
Dr. Rosalind Osgood, chair of the Broward County School Board, weighed in on the statement from the governor’s office.
“You’re going to have to make a decision to not take your salary so that money can go toward the classroom,” she said.
The latest development comes a day after the Broward Teachers Union confirmed two teachers and an assistant died from COVID-19 in a 24-hour period.
One of the teachers was 48-year-old Janice Wright, who taught at Pinewood Elementary School in North Lauderdale. The other two women who died worked at Dillard Elementary in Fort Lauderdale and were also in their upper 40s.
Officials said all three of them were unvaccinated.
“This is why I have been so adamant about every person in our school environment wearing a mask, because we continue to lose people,” said Osgood.
Miami-Dade County Public Schools said a decision on a mask mandate will come next week, and indications are that they will start school in masks as well.
“Our children’s lives, their well-being, the lives of our teachers, your lives are too important,” said M-DCPS Superintendent Alberto Carvalho.
As of Friday afternoon, six Miami-Dade School Board members have said they will vote in favor of requiring face coverings.
Officials with the Archdiocese of Miami said students at Catholic schools in Miami-Dade and Broward counties will start the school year wearing masks in the classroom.
But a group of parents who came together outside the archdiocese’s building in Miami Shores on Friday morning said it should be up to families to decide whether their children wear masks.
“We want that freedom, and our Catholic Church should understand that, yes, we are obedient, but we also have to do things within reason,” said parent Tammy Garcia.
“We don’t feel heard right now. It’s a mandate, and where is our voice?” said parent Maria Elena Martinez.
In late July, the CDC recommended that all students, regardless of vaccination status, wear masks while in school to help slow the spread of COVID-19.
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