Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt today issued a formal legal opinion addressing the authority of boards of county commissioners and local school boards to adopt public health measures to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in local public and private schools that include provisions different from executive orders issued by the governor. …
Synopsis: Because Executive Order 20-59 is a statewide order relating to public health, boards of county commissioners have statutory authority under L. 2020 Special Session, Ch. 1, § 33 to issue an order relating to public health that is less stringent than the provisions of Executive Order 20-59, if the required statutory findings are made. Boards of county commissioners, acting as a county board of health, also have authority under L. 2020 Special Session, Ch. 1, §§ 37 and 38, to review, amend, or revoke any orders issued by a local health officer as a result of an executive order of the governor. In addition, local public schools also may obtain such flexibility from their local school boards, which ordinarily have statutory and constitutional authority to adopt local policies governing matters such as wearing masks, social distancing, washing hands, and temperature taking in local schools, and Executive Order 20-59 has not displaced that preexisting local authority.
The opinion is available at http://ag.ks.gov/opinions.
