San Diego County judge blocks state from enforcing school reopening rules

A San Diego County judge on Monday issued a ruling blocking California from enforcing rules that limited school re-openings, according to the San Diego Union Tribune.

Judge Cynthia Freeland sided with parents who sued state leaders and wanted to overturn school reopening rules that the state issued in January. It’s unclear what impact the ruling will have statewide.

The rules issued in January prevented middle and high schools from reopening while their county remains in the purple tier, the most restrictive in California’s system that assigns each county a tier based on the spread of Covid-19 in each county. San Diego is expected to enter the red tier this week, so high schools and middle schools in the county would be eligible to reopen anyway,  according to The Tribune.

The state’s January rules also required schools that reopen to have at least four feet of distance between students in classrooms.