The borough assembly has denied the school district’s request for an exemption from Wrangell’s testing and isolation requirements for unvaccinated students who travel.
In October, the district had requested students and staff traveling for extracurricular activities, such as sports, be exempt from the borough’s COVID-19 emergency ordinance testing and isolation requirements since it wouldn’t allow students and staff to attend events on back-to-back weekends.
The assembly denied the request at its Nov. 9 meeting.
“We believed, based on the last assembly meeting, that it was a possibility that creating exemptions might not be allowed, as the overall safety of our community is the ultimate goal,” Schools Superintendent Bill Burr said the day after the assembly decision.
Burr said the district would continue to follow the borough’s requirements and its own mitigation plans.
“We feel that the school district’s testing regimen is a strong one for our student-athletes, and we will continue to follow our guidelines as we have through the school year.”
Students who travel for extracurricular activities are tested before leaving Wrangell and upon returning. In some cases, they test while away, as was the case for one student-athlete who tested positive for COVID-19 while attending the state swim meet in Anchorage on Nov. 5 and 6. Another student tested positive after returning from a wrestling match also in Anchorage that same weekend.
The volleyball team was scheduled to go to Petersburg that same weekend, but that trip was canceled due to the sharp rise in cases there.
Assembly members on Nov. 9 discussed whether the school district’s testing policy was stricter than that of the borough — and reached different conclusions.
“I don’t think the school has a stricter travel policy,” Assemblymember Ryan Howe said.
Assemblymember Anne Morrison said students and staff test twice a week when traveling. “In that aspect, it is a stricter policy,” she said.
“What does ‘stricter’ mean? If the superintendent came to us asking us to reduce it,” said Assemblymember Jim DeBord. “It doesn’t make sense. We’re getting into exempting an entity? How many? How diluted will that be?”
The assembly voted down the waiver.
Burr said the district would continue to evaluate each extracurricular event as cases arise. The district’s travel committee, which includes representatives from the borough’s emergency operations center, meets before any travel to discuss Wrangell’s status and the status of the communities where students and staff are planning to traveling.
“We look at each team, event and location separately in the same way we have done the past two years,” Burr said. “When we are hosting an event, we also look at circumstances that might impact sport activities.”
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