Orange County Board of Education votes to sue governor to allow schools to reopen in person

The Orange County Board of Education voted 4-0 on Tuesday to sue Gov. Newsom to allow schools in the county to reopen for in-person instruction, even though the county is on the state’s “monitoring list” for Covid-19, the Voice of Orange County reported. Newsom and the California Department of Public Health issued guidance on July 17 that prohibits schools in counties on the list from reopening for in-person instruction until they have been removed from the list for 14 consecutive days.

Jesse Melgar, spokesperson for the Governor’s Office, said in a statement that the state’s Covid-19 guidance is driven by science. “Courts have repeatedly upheld the governor’s emergency authority to issue orders protecting public health in the face of this devastating virus,” Melgar said. “We are confident that will again be the case here.”

The Orange County Board of Education is an elected body.

Orange County Superintendent of Schools Al Mijares, who is independently elected by county voters, said in a statement Wednesday that he was “disappointed, but not surprised” by the planned legal action by the board, which came “on the heels of recommending students return to school without face coverings or social distancing.” The state guidance requires staff and students in grades 3-12 to wear masks and to implement physical distancing when schools reopen for in-person instruction.

Mijares noted that individual district school boards and superintendents in the county “will continue to approve and implement their own plans based on the guidance of state and local public health agencies and the needs of their communities.” He said the Orange County Board of Education’s decision to sue the state “continues the pattern of a highly litigious board majority that seems to have no qualms about diverting time, energy and financial resources from students and programs to satisfy their own ideological interests.”

Mijares is on the EdSource Board of Directors. The directors do not provide input or oversight of EdSource’s daily editorial content.