Manatee School Board stays the course after anti-mask protesters fill meeting
Declaring the COVID-19 pandemic over, dozens of people filled the Manatee County School Board meeting on Tuesday evening and demanded a stop to a districtwide mask mandate.
More than 60 people gathered outside of the School Support Center, 215 Manatee Ave. W. in Bradenton, just before the 5:45 p.m. meeting. Holding a microphone and standing on the tailgate of a white pickup truck, one woman encouraged protesters to enter the meeting chambers and remove their masks, violating the board’s mask policy.
“The only way that we get out of this is if parents make them submit,” she said. “We cannot depend just on DeSantis, who is a rock star.”
Gov. Ron DeSantis declared on May 3 that Florida was “no longer in a state of emergency” before signing an executive order suspending all local emergency orders. And though the order has no effect on schools, according to the Florida Department of Education, it still empowered families who oppose masks.
Calling for “mutiny” if the School Board refused to end its mask mandate on Tuesday night, the woman ended her pre-meeting speech by saying that “COVID is over.”
School guardians — armed security guards with no law enforcement authority — joined Bradenton police officers in trying to stop the maskless men, women and children as they entered the administration building. Most lifted up their face coverings and then quickly removed them inside the meeting room.
School Board Chairman Charlie Kennedy pleaded with the packed room, urging people to follow district policy and wear a face covering.
“Governor DeSantis on May 3 lifted the emergency order, OK, which means there’s no more pandemic,” a woman said, yelling out from her seat. “Which means we don’t have to wear a mask, and we live in America. We have our freedoms.”
After calling a brief recess, Kennedy continued the meeting after most protesters refused to budge.
“If you don’t mind, put your mask on,” the chairman said. “If you refuse, you refuse. I can’t police every single body in the room and I don’t want to turn this into a circus where people are being taken out.”
A handful of people wore blue surgical masks with a message inscribed in red: “Unmask our kids.” And one man wore a black shirt with white letters. “Masks Are Slavery,” it read.
The man, who identified himself as Jonathan Riches, also wore a leather vest with a large patch that said, “Born To Ride For Donald J. Trump.”
“There’s going to be more speakers here, trust me,” he said. “This is a patriot call of action. I know I’m live on TV. All the patriots listening out there, all Americans, if you’re tired of wearing masks or you’re tired of your children wearing masks, come out and speak.”
At least 18 people spoke in favor of removing the mask mandate. They advocated for parental choice and claimed that masks put students’ health in grave danger — a widely circulated myth on social media and other corners of the internet.
School Board member Scott Hopes, who is also the acting county administrator for Manatee County government, decided to join the meeting virtually at its start, avoiding the crowd of yelling people.
Hopes is the board’s leading health expert. As someone with a master of public health degree in epidemiology, he often highlighted the importance of masks and other safety measures during the pandemic.
“This is a tough time for all of us,” he said on Tuesday, shortly after joining the in-person meeting. “When COVID hit, it turned things upside down. It turned people’s lives upside down. By now, most of us know somebody who was sick. Most of us know multiple people who have died from COVID.”
As of Tuesday, the Florida Department of Health recorded 678 deaths and nearly 39,000 positive COVID-19 cases in Manatee County since the pandemic began. The school district recorded at least 661 cases and thousands of related exposures in schools and district offices during the current semester.
Using the mask mandate and other protocols, Manatee County schools were able to reopen before many other districts throughout Florida and the nation, Hopes said on Tuesday.
While he was among several board members to laud the effectiveness of masks, the board was already moving toward ending its mandate with a vote on May 25. Vaccines are more widely available and the state’s education commissioner, Richard Corcoran, urged school districts to make masks voluntary in the upcoming school year.
The board’s draft plan for 2021-22 would do just that. However, it would also give Superintendent Cynthia Saunders the ability to reinstitute a mask policy if schools suffered an outbreak or if Manatee County’s positivity rate exceeded a certain percentage.
Most protesters decried any form of a mask policy, while others encouraged the School Board to revise its plan. Instead of giving the superintendent sole authority to turn a mask mandate on and off, leave that decision to a majority vote of the board, they said.
In response, Kennedy and board member Gina Messenger said the draft would be discussed and possibly edited during their May 25 meeting.
Board members voted last month to advertise potential changes to policy and they were required to wait 28 days before officially voting on those changes, forcing them to wait until their next meeting, the chairman said.
“There’s so much diversity of opinion about these mask mandates,” Kennedy said. “We hear you loud and clear. You want it gone tomorrow morning. I just don’t think that’s realistic.”
THE BIG VOTE
What: The School Board will vote on whether to end its mask mandate by early June.
When and where: The meeting is scheduled for 5 p.m. May 25. Board meetings take place at the School Support Center, 215 Manatee Ave. W., Bradenton.
Restrictions: In-person guests must wear a mask and undergo a temperature check.
How to watch on TV: Anyone can also watch the meetings by visiting the Manatee Schools Television website, mstv.us, and by tuning into Spectrum Channel 646 or Frontier Channel 39.
This story was originally published May 12, 2021 at 3:59 PM.