Updated: Jun. 18, 2021, 3:14 p.m. | Published: Jun. 18, 2021, 2:05 p.m.
By Erik Bascome | tbascome@siadvance.com
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — The message from Staten Island’s elected officials is simple: Unmask our kids.
On Friday, Staten Island elected officials including Councilman Steven Matteo (R-Mid-Island), Councilman Joseph Borelli (R-South Shore), Assemblyman Michael Reilly (R-South Shore) and Assemblyman Michael Tannousis (R-East Shore/South Brooklyn), gathered outside P.S. 6 in Tottenville to call on the city and state to remove the mask mandate in New York schools.
“Parents need to know now that starting in September there should not be a requirement to wear masks,” Matteo said. “The governor needs to lift that requirement and the mayor needs to follow suit as soon as possible.”
Despite Governor Andrew Cuomo lifting the vast majority of coronavirus (COVID-19) restrictions throughout the state on Tuesday as the percentage of adults who’ve received at least one shot of the coronavirus vaccine reached 70%, students are still required to wear masks in all indoor school settings.
“In almost every single setting in Staten Island and New York City at large, you’re not required to wear masks. It is just absurd, foolish and shortsighted to pretend that only in school buildings is it unsafe for children to go unmasked,” said Borelli.
“The idiocy of all these mandates that we’ve seen, the contradictions we’ve seen between the state government and the city government, it’s just absurd,” Reilly said.
Tannousis spoke to the additional strain that the mask requirement has placed on some of Staten Island’s youngest students as they struggle to readjust to in-person learning.
“Any teacher or parent will tell you that it is difficult to have a child be attentive during class, at school and at home. Can you imagine what it’s like to require this child to also have a mask on during school? It’s inconceivable, it must end and I call on both the city and the state to remove this mandate,” said Tannousis.
Cuomo had previously announced his intention to remove the mask mandate in schools earlier this month, but after receiving pushback from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the state only elected to remove the mask requirement for outdoor school settings, but continues to require mask usage indoors.
“We talked to them about the in school mask and the outside school mask rules. They were comfortable with the outside mask requirement. They were not comfortable with the inside mask requirement,” the governor said at June 7 press conference.
Cuomo noted that with just a few weeks left in the school year, the CDC advised the state that it would be better served maintaining its existing guidance through the end of the school year and preparing new guidance for September.
“You would have to do a whole new set of guidance. You only have two weeks. You’d have to communicate with all the parents. You’d have to communicate with the teachers. Leave it alone for two weeks, but get it ready for September is basically what they said,” Cuomo told reporters.
Meanwhile, the New York City Department of Education (DOE) has said that safety remains their top priority and that the mask requirement will continue until new guidance advises otherwise.
“The health and safety of our students, educators and staff remain our top priority and our mask policy will continue to be based on the latest guidance from our health and medical experts,” said DOE spokeswoman Danielle Filson.
Elected officials said that the in-school mask mandate should be removed immediately to accommodate summer programming, but at the very least, parents should be told whether or not masks will still be required come September.
“They should take the mandate off now. I don’t think they’re going to do that for the last week… but with that said, if you’re going to finish out the school year with the mandate, say September that there’s going to be no mandate and kids do not have to wear masks in school,” Matteo said.