KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — After months of controversy, Governor Bill Lee signed an executive order on Friday that ended a requirement for school systems to let parents choose whether to follow mask mandates in schools.
He signed Executive Order 92 which terminated Executive Order 84, no longer giving parents the choice to opt students out of wearing a mask in schools. In the order, he said that it ended as a result of legislation signed after lawmakers' special session on COVID-19.
On Friday, he signed legislation that says government entities, including public schools, can only require masks when a county has registered at least 1,000 new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people over two weeks. The metric must be met every two weeks to continue renewing a mask mandate and religious and medical exemptions must be offered.
However, the state-level legislation does not supersede a federal court's order. So, Knox County Schools must continue following the federal court's decision to continue the same mask requirement it had implemented in the 2020-2021 school year.
As a result of the special session, the school system may also be required to provide N95-equivalent masks for students and staff. Schools would also be banned from using state money to buy the masks, according to the state's new legislation.
Senior Judge Ronnie Greer ordered the board to put a mask mandate in place in September as a health safety measure under federal law. He previously said it was a way to make sure schools were a safe place for students at risk for COVID-19, accommodating their health needs as needed in federal law.
Information about how Knox County Schools planned to respond to the executive action and the new state's new set of COVID-19 laws was not immediately available. This story will be updated when more information is available.