Gov. DeSantis Reverses Mask Punishment, Funding Cut For FL Schools

FLORIDA — Sarasota County Schools and 11 other districts will no longer be penalized for disobeying the state by implementing mask mandates during a surge in COVID-19 cases at the start of the 2021-22 school year.

The districts put their mask policies in place in the late summer and early fall — a time when the spread of the delta variant was rampant, driving up coronavirus cases throughout the state. Despite the surge in cases, Gov. Ron DeSantis banned mask mandates for public schools through an executive order.

As punishment for defying the order, the 12 districts that required masks — Alachua, Brevard, Broward, Duval, Hillsborough, Indian River, Leon, Miami-Dade, Orange, Palm Beach, Sarasota and Volusia counties — stood to lose about $200 million collectively in budget cuts at the direction of the state legislature.

Sarasota County alone was slated to lose about $12 million in sanctions.

The governor reconsidered the matter, directing Florida’s new education commissioner, Manny Diaz, Thursday on how to handle the money in the state’s School Recognition Program, the fund where the $200 million was being withheld. The program gives financial awards to public schools that receive an "A" rating or improve by at least one letter grade and sustain the improvement the following school year.

In a letter to the commissioner, DeSantis said that under this program, schools can’t be punished because of actions taken by the district.

“Compliance with law by the schools, and not the districts, drive the allocation of funds for the program. At most, districts are a pass through, as districts have no lawful means to spend these funds,” DeSantis wrote. “My approval and your subsequent implementation of this funding must rely on the plain language that districts’ actions do not impact schools’ eligibility.”

He praised Florida’s educators for how they handled teaching during the pandemic, saying that they “did an admirable job under unprecedented circumstances.”

The governor also ordered Diaz “to implement the Florida School Recognition Program consistent with this reading of the language, which is to reward eligible schools for their achievements, as districts’ actions have no bearing on a school’s eligibility.”

Patch has reached out to Sarasota County Schools for comment.

The Sarasota County School Board approved the district’s emergency mask mandate Aug. 20 as the school year started, and COVID-19 cases surged in the community.

The school board stood by its mask mandate despite threats from the Florida Department of Education to withhold board members' salaries for defying the state's school mask policy.

In a September letter sent to Richard Corcoran, the state's education commissioner at the time, on behalf of the school board, attorney Daniel J. DeLeo said the board "contend(s) that its emergency face mask policy… is both lawful and compliant with the recently enacted HB 241 (2021) — the Parents' Bill of Rights."

In his letter, the lawyer said that one of the statutes of the Parents' Bill of Rights "creates a statutory framework for evaluating the interplay between fundamental parental rights and conflicting governmental actions."

This Florida Statue, 1014.03, prohibits governmental institutions, including school boards from "infring(ing) on the fundamental rights of a parent to direct the upbringing, education, health care and mental health of his or her minor child without demonstrating that such action is reasonable and necessary to achieve a compelling state interest and that such action is narrowly tailored and is not otherwise served by less restrictive means," DeLeo said.

The attorney argued that Sarasota County's emergency mask policy complied with this standard, while the Florida Department of Health's emergency rule on masks "inadequately implement(ed) the same statutory provision."

DeLeo added, "Specifically, the emergency DOH rule — which requires absolute parental opt out to face mask mandates without satisfaction of any preconditions — is unlawful because it wholly fails to consider a school board's constitutional and statutory obligations to govern in furtherance of student health, safety and welfare during a global pandemic. In other words, the (district's) emergency policy is within the lawful parameters of the (Parents' Bill of Rights) framework while the emergency DOH rule — at least as it is interpreted by DOE — is not."

He added that "because the emergency DOH rule fails to account for a school board's right to enact procedures that conflict with fundamental parental rights when warranted by compelling interests, it is arbitrary, overbroad in its application, beyond or inconsistent with delegated authority, ultra vires, and, as a result, unlawful."

His letter also contended that it was "compelling" and "reasonable" for the Sarasota County School Board to enact its emergency policy because of the “threat to student health, safety and welfare posed by COVID-19 in Florida and Sarasota County."