Long Island districts await direction on possible COVID-19 testing for school staff
Educators on Long Island are questioning — and awaiting guidance on — Gov. Kathy Hochul's proposal to mandate COVID-19 testing for school personnel who aren't vaccinated against the virus.
Hochul on Tuesday announced she wanted the state Department of Health to require teachers and other school personnel to undergo weekly testing unless they have been vaccinated. She said the state was in the process of getting the legal clearance to impose the requirement for all staff at public and private schools statewide.
"Who will be required to administer the tests for those who have made the personal choice not to receive this vaccine? Who will pay for the tests? Is there a level of vaccination per district that can be achieved to forego future testing?" read one letter, signed by two leaders of the William Floyd School District in Brookhaven Town, Superintendent Kevin Coster and school board president Robert Vecchio, and sent to Hochul and other state officials.
The letter also asks the governor’s office to reconsider the statewide school mask mandate, announced last week, and return control back to each district. The district had proposed a "hybrid-masking" approach for students and staff regardless of vaccination status, with schoolchildren being allowed to lower their masks when seated at their desks "socially distanced from others."
Tonie McDonald, president of the Nassau County Council of School Superintendents, said Wednesday that while districts await guidance from the state, they are looking into using a third-party testing company should tests be required. School nurses may be an option in smaller districts, said McDonald, who also is superintendent of the Levittown district.
Teachers union weighs in
Kevin Coyne, president of the Brentwood Teachers Association labor union, said there is support for the mask mandate but not vaccinations for staff. Testing of teachers would have to be worked out with the district through the collective bargaining process, though it is not being discussed, he said.
Given the size and scope of Brentwood — the Island’s largest district — testing unvaccinated staff would be difficult, he said, adding it would represent another unfunded mandate for the district.
A testing mandate is "something a politician states without a real genuine understanding of how it would impact a district like Brentwood with close to 3,000 employees and 19,000 students," Coyne said.
"There are a lot of details that would need to be worked out … Some of the smaller school districts may have available staff to do that, but Brentwood is stretched extremely thin," he said, and mandatory testing in the district that has 18 buildings would be a "huge, huge undertaking."
A state health panel is scheduled to meet in Albany on Thursday to consider two emergency authorizations that would impact schools — including a requirement that schools again report COVID-19 positive test results daily to the state Department of Health.
The Special Public Health and Health Planning Council also will consider a requirement to give the health commissioner authorization to mandate routine COVID-19 testing "in certain settings, which may include schools, homeless shelters, correctional facilities, nursing homes, and health care settings, and which may distinguish between individuals who have received full vaccination against COVID-19 and those who have not," according to a notice on the health department’s website.
The governor’s office could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Some districts in other regions have announced plans for routine testing. The Syracuse district noted on its reopening plans that it would work with the local health department to conduct randomized, voluntary pool testing of students and staff.
The Rochester district has agreed to partner with Walgreens for free weekly testing of unvaccinated staff, according to media reports.
NYC ready to give booster shots
Meanwhile, Mayor Bill de Blasio said New York City has "a really vast supply of vaccine in reserve and ready" to administer booster shots against the coronavirus.
The Biden administration has decided that Americans should get a booster shot eight months after becoming fully vaccinated, possibly beginning later this month — and perhaps after just five months.
Speaking at his daily news conference Wednesday, de Blasio said the city would tap the existing infrastructure set up when the vaccines first became available late last year.
The city’s existing capacity is "vast and very, very, decentralized throughout the whole five boroughs," in addition to vast vaccination sites, the mayor said.
"We’re gonna repeat all that, and we have the capacity obviously to go to homes of people who need it," de Blasio said. "So, we’re building it out right now. We’re still a few weeks away from being authorized by the federal government to act."
The booster decision is not without controversy. The New York Times reported Tuesday that the head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s vaccine office and her deputy would depart in the fall, citing disagreement about the booster announcement, with neither believing there is enough data yet to justify the policy.
Across the state, 27 more people died Tuesday of COVID-19, including two residents of Nassau County and four from Suffolk, according to a news release sent Wednesday afternoon by Hochul’s office. That brings the state’s death toll to 55,621.
There were 829 additional cases of the virus detected on Long Island — 457 in Suffolk and 372 in Nassau, according to the release. The Island's seven-day average of positive test results ticked up to 4.44% Tuesday from 4.38% on Monday.
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Joie Tyrrell is a Long Island native and covers education for Newsday, where she has worked since 1998.
