Cuomo declares N.Y. schools safe to reopen
NEW YORK — Schools across the state can reopen for in-person instruction this fall, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Friday, solidifying New York’s status as one of the few states in the U.S. with a virus transmission rate low enough to bring children back into classrooms — not only in its rural communities but also in the country’s biggest city.
Just a few months after New York became a global epicenter of the pandemic, the governor opened the door for millions of students across the state to return to classrooms, even as most public school students in the country will start the school year remotely.
But Cuomo’s announcement doesn’t guarantee that school buildings in the state’s more than 700 local districts actually will reopen in the coming weeks. It’s now up to local politicians and superintendents to decide whether to reopen and how to do so. Their in-person reopening plans also must be approved by the state’s education and health departments in the coming weeks.
Under the governor’s announcement, schools can decide to open as long as they’re in a region where the average rate of positive coronavirus tests is below 5 percent over a two-week period, based on reporting from all the state’s counties. That threshold was recommended by the World Health Organization to begin general reopening that recently has been adopted by some school districts.
Most of the state, including New York City, has maintained a positivity rate of about 1 percent. Mayor Bill de Blasio has said schools can only open in the city if the positivity rate is below 3 percent.
“All schools can open,” Cuomo said during a news conference.
“If anyone can open schools, we can open schools,” he said. “We have the best infection rate in the country.”
Governors in other states, including Greg Abbott of Texas and Ron DeSantis of Florida, have gone beyond Cuomo by actively encouraging school districts in their states to reopen. But the pandemic is raging in those states, prompting officials in major districts such as Houston and Miami-Dade to announce that they’d start the school year remote-only.
The school reopening debate, however, presents the governor with a political conundrum from which it might be difficult to emerge unscathed.
If the city does reopen schools, it could alienate him from educators and the teachers’ union, a crucial ally. But if the city halts or delays its opening plan, it could leave more than 1 million families in the lurch over child care, and hundreds of thousands of low-income children, homeless children and students with disabilities without in-person learning for months to come.
Cuomo acknowledged those difficulties Friday, saying he had been “deluged” with calls from parents and teachers who have concerns about reopening.
“If the teachers don’t come back, then you can’t really open the schools,” he said. “If the parents don’t send their students, then you’re not really opening the schools.”
Union leaders who represent teachers in New York City and the rest of the state have raised alarms about reopening, saying they don’t believe it’s safe to do in-person instruction in at least some parts of the state. Cuomo has a political alliance with Michael Mulgrew, president of the city’s powerful United Federation of Teachers, which represents New York City teachers.
Although it’s illegal for teachers to strike in New York, Mulgrew recently hinted at potential legal action against the city if it reopens schools and the union doesn’t believe adequate safety precautions are in place.
And Friday, Mulgrew responded to the governor’s announcement with a terse statement: “As Gov. Cuomo noted, parents and teachers must be confident that schools are safe before they can reopen. In New York City, that is still an open question.”
Teachers older than 65 and those with pre-existing conditions are eligible for medical exemptions that will allow them to work from home.
“I don’t think you want to get into a legal battle with the teachers,” Cuomo said Friday. “Teachers have to feel safe. They can’t teach if they don’t feel safe.”