Bill stripping health powers from counties will become state law
Gov. Bill Lee last week declined to sign a bill aimed at stripping county health departments of local control, although the legislation will still become law this week.
After signing an omnibus bill rolling back many COVID-19 mitigation efforts, Lee returned the county health department legislation to the General Assembly without his signature.
In a letter to Lt. Gov. Randy McNally and House of Representatives Speaker Cameron Sexton, Lee indicated there is a “joint commitment” to pursue “necessary updates” to the bill in the upcoming January session.
“I have spoken with Lt. Gov. McNally and Speaker Sexton and am not signing this bill as it requires significant updates to account for the non-pandemic functions of public health departments,” Lee said in a statement. “We are committed to working together to address these changes during the regular session.”
The bill gives the governor jurisdiction over the state’s county health departments, six of which currently operate independently, and limits the departments from issuing health orders during a pandemic. The health directors of the independent departments in Davidson, Shelby, Knox, Hamilton, Madison and Sullivan counties also become appointments of the state health commissioner under the law.
The Nashville Metro Public Health Department said Friday it “continues to recommend wearing masks in crowded indoor settings” but revised it from a requirement to a recommendation, per the new law.
“Lower case numbers, rising vaccination rates and a change in state law have led Metro to revise its mask policy for Metro facilities from a requirement to a recommendation,” Brian Todd, spokesman for the Nashville Metro Public Health Department, said in a statement. “MPHD continues to recommend masks in schools while vaccinations increase among our young students.”
Dr. Michelle Taylor, director of the Shelby County Health Department, sharply criticized the package of bills after their dead-of-night passage, calling the legislation “extremely harmful” to public health in Tennessee.
“I tell you that if the governor signs this law, every decision we make in a pandemic will have to go through Nashville,” Taylor told the Memphis Commercial Appeal last week. “We will have to run all decisions based upon local lives, life and death situations, through Nashville. If we have another impending collapse of our health system, we will have to call Nashville first.”
Lee on Friday also issued a new executive order negating Executive Order 84, which allowed parents to opt their children out of school mask requirements for any reason. The order was blocked in Williamson, Knox and Shelby counties after three federal judges ruled in the favor of parents of children with disabilities suing the state under the Americans with Disabilities Act over the original order.
The order and its subsequent extensions are unnecessary under the new legislation package, according to Lee’s Friday order.
The omnibus legislation takes immediate effect with Lee’s signature. Pushed through in a latenight special session earlier this month, it marked a significant political win for Republicans. It drew concern not just from Democrats but from hospitals and business interests and drew immediate legal challenges similar to the nowmoot fight against Lee’s executive order on masks in schools.
The new law restricts private businesses from requiring COVID-19 vaccination proof and only allows schools and other public entities to enact mask mandates under an extreme surge of 1,000 infections or more for every 100,000 residents in a 14-day period.