It needed to be done. At the end of June, Governor Ducey signed HB2898, which included a provision prohibiting a city, town, county, school board, or charter school governing body from requiring students or teachers to wear masks.
Bear in mind that this law doesn’t mean students and teachers can’t wear masks. They certainly can if they want to. But it keeps the heavy hand of government from enforcing unnecessary restrictions—especially on students who should be focused on learning.
Predictably, the liberal left has had a meltdown. The board president at Northland Preparatory Academy in Flagstaff went on a tirade in a now-removed Facebook post, referring to parents and students who disagree with mask mandates as “the worst of humanity.”
And some schools have decided that their first lesson for the year is to teach kids it’s ok to violate the law. A growing number of Arizona school districts are openly defying Governor Ducey by requiring students and staff to wear masks if they want to set foot on campus.
Our children have become pawns in a game of COVID chess—all at the mercy of the kings and queens on school boards throughout the state.
While parents are speaking up, they need help. Thankfully, Arizona’s House and Senate Republicans heard their cries. Last week, a group led by state representative Jake Hoffman called for Governor Ducey to do something…
PHOENIX — Governor Doug Ducey signed Rep. Joseph Chaplik’s bill, HB 2770, which empowers businesses in Arizona to decide whether or not to enforce on its premises a mask mandate that is imposed by politicians from the state, county, city/town or other jurisdiction in Arizona.
Chaplik says he proposed the measure because “business owners should be allowed to decide for themselves whether to require their customers to wear masks.”
“Recent developments show that without a protection in law, businesses and their customers are subject to the decisions of local rogue politicians who want to control you indefinitely,” said Chaplik. “This bill did not receive any Democrat votes throughout the entire process.”
The Free Enterprise club called Chaplik’s bill a “a commonsense solution” because it “allows people to exercise their freedom while removing the burden from businesses to play mask police.”
The governor issued an executive order last month banning local mask mandates, however several cities run by Democrats have refused to rescind their mask mandates. The governor never issued a mandatory state-wide mask mandate, but several democrat-controlled cities did. Those cities then failed to enforce their mandates, leaving the responsibility to local businesses. The governor said in the bill’s transmittal letter to Secretary of State Katie Hobbs that the cities’ failure caused “concern and heartache for many businesses.”
The governor called Chaplik’s bill “well-intentioned,” in his letter of transmittal, but “due to an error in drafting, may have unintended consequences.”
“Some rational mass requirements are not related to the spread of COVID-19 may not be enforceable,” explained the governor. “The state needs to be able to enforce long-standing workplace safety and infection control standards unrelated to COVID-19. I am grateful to the sponsor, Rep. Joseph Chaplik, for agreeing to fix this technical oversight in a future bill this session. With his commitment to fix this oversight, I am signing this bill, ensuring that our small businesses will no longer be required to enforce mandates imposed on them by the cities who are choosing not to force it themselves.”
Fact check: True. The data is stunning: 97% mask compliance in San Francisco, NY, DC, 96% in Miami and Philly, 95% in Chicago.
