Parents Group Calls For Reopening Schools In Putnam County

PUTNAM COUNTY, NY — More than 70 people rallied on the steps of the historic Putnam County Courthouse Thursday demanding that school districts and the local health department work together to reopen schools for full-time, in-person learning.

"People have passed their level of patience," Jamie Callanan, one of the organizers, told Patch. She said the ever-shifting mixtures of remote and hybrid learning and the on-again, off-again pattern of quarantines and closures over the past year are "crushing our children."

Members of the group, Reopen Putnam Schools, are also circulating petitions throughout the communities, including this one in Mahopac.

They're among several parent groups in the Hudson Valley and across the state who are pointing out data showing schools are among the safest places for children to be in the coronavirus pandemic, because New York state's data shows spread rates by children in schools are very low, ranging from 0.19 to 0.46 percent.

"I know the severity of this pandemic," parent Wendy Lewis, who had COVID-19 this winter, told Patch. "I also know what's going on with our children. They need to be back in school."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released updated guidance for reopening schools on Friday. The report said the data suggests that it is possible for communities to bring down cases of COVID-19 while keeping schools open to in-person instruction, and that furthermore, models of consistent implementation of mitigation measures in schools have shown success in limiting outbreaks and infections in schools

"Schools should be the last places closed and the first places opened," said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the CDC.

The problems for learning, for working parents, and for children's mental health, including teen suicide rates, have been charted.

The CDC says school administrators should work with local public health officials to assess the level of risk in the community since the risk of introduction of a case in the school setting is dependent on the level of community transmission.

But the leaders of Reopen Putnam Schools say Putnam County health officials are being far more restrictive about what district officials must close if a child or staff member has tested positive.

Children are either missing school because they are needlessly in quarantine or schools are closed due to quarantine-instigated staff shortages. And yet schools elsewhere in New York are open and have applied different rules, they said.

Patch reached out to county officials for comment but had not heard back by the time this report was published.