Governor ends school indoor mask mandate beginning March 2
New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced February 27 that she will lift the state’s indoor mask mandate for schools beginning Wednesday, March 2.
During her Sunday afternoon COVID briefing, the governor said she based her ruling on February 25 guidance from the Centers for Disease Control that removes indoor mask requirements in “low or medium” risk level settings. She said the CDC decision, sharply lower positive cases in New York, and the state’s high vaccination rate among students all underpin her decision.
Neighbor states such as Massachusetts and Connecticut had lifted their school mandates earlier in February.
The governor said her office plans to issue guidance “over the next two days,” giving students and school districts “time to get back from the winter break” before ending the mask mandate on Wednesday.
New York’s indoor mask mandate remains in place for nursing home and adult care facilities, hospitals, correctional facilities, homeless and domestic violence shelters and, pursuant to federal requirement, buses, trains, subways, and airplanes. The governor said Sunday that she would “monitor these facilities the same way we monitored schools,” hinting at the possibility for relaxed mask standards in the near future.
She said individual counties across the state retain the right to issue indoor mask mandates in schools if any county considers itself in a high-risk situation, adding that she “hopes any county will take a look at the CDC information” before rendering a decision.
Otsego County is not among the counties in New York that would fall under the CDC’s “high risk” platform (“high potential for healthcare system strain; high level of severe illness”).
The governor said students may still wear masks indoors at schools and said the state will “tolerate no bullying or ostracization of students or families who exercise their right to wear a mask indoors.”
Being in florida I’m not too familiar with NYS Mask mandates so, Maybe somebody can help me out here. I see in the sports section of a mohawk valley publication photos of high school wrestlers competing without masks. Yet the basketball players are all masked up??? Hows that make sense??
Dont know if this helps any smitty, but I looked at some of the interscholastic sport activities photos that you mentioned. I see the wrestlers with no masks, I see the hoop players also, masked up as you say but, masks only covering their mouths for the most part, not their nose? Not sure if that violates the NYS Mandates. Being in Florida, looking in from the outside, I’m sure this must look surreal.