Lima schools lifts mask mandate

LIMA — Lima schools ended its mask mandate after a special school board meeting Tuesday.

The school board’s unanimous decision to make masks optional on school buses, in school buildings and at district events came hours after Allen County Public Health lifted its indoor mask advisory, which had been in place since last September, due to improving coronavirus case and hospitalization rates.

“This has been an ongoing review and a high priority since the very beginning,” said Sandra Monford, the board’s president.

Superintendent Jill Ackerman recommended the change Tuesday, citing the new recommendations from the health department, the district’s student doctor and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and recent inquiries from parents.

Parents were notified via email and text message Tuesday after the board’s vote.

The CDC on Sunday lifted its federal mask mandate for K-12 school buses, days after the agency relaxed its masking guidance for the public so that only those who are at high risk for severe illness or who are sick with COVID-19 are urged to wear a mask indoors in most places as the U.S. pandemic outlook improves.

Allen County Public Health quickly followed suit, as did local school districts that still required masks on school buses.

“We want to advise people going out and about in the community to continue to be vigilant when they’re out and about,” said Brandon Fischer, Allen County’s Health Commissioner. “If they’re in larger crowded settings, they may feel more comfortable wearing a mask.”

Lima schools had been waiting until Allen County was no longer deemed a high-transmission county by the CDC to revise its pandemic protocols, Ackerman said.

For the first time since the start of the pandemic, Ackerman said the district had zero students or staff out sick with COVID-19 or in quarantine because of an exposure in school last week. The district continues to report zero instances of positive cases or quarantines as of Tuesday evening.

Still, Ackerman advised that the district’s protocols may be reversed at any time if the situation merits.

“It’s all new territory for us,” she said, “but we feel right now that with all these other protocols in place we could remove the mask mandate.”