Council Rock School Board Voted To Pull COVID-19 Dashboard From Website

NEWTOWN, PA — The dashboard reporting positive COVID-19 cases in Council Rock students and staff has vanished from the district website, following a motion and vote by the school board during Thursday's meeting.

The change came after the board voted 6-3 to both remove the dashboard and the section of the plan with guidance for mask-wearing in those who'd had close contact with a COVID-positive person, or had a recent positive case of COVID-19.

The board had set an agenda item to discuss the Council Rock School District's health and safety plan, but had not listed this specific motion.

But then, in a motion rapidly seconded by Kristin Marcell, Michael Thorwart moved to remove the following language from the safety plan:

The [district] will work in consultation with the Bucks County Health Department to identify close contacts of positive cases.

• Asymptomatic individuals with a non-ongoing exposure to COVID-19 may continue in school normally unless symptoms develop.
• Asymptomatic individuals with an ongoing household exposure to COVID-19 must wear a mask for a minimum of one week from the symptom onset of the household member without exception. In households with multiple positives, the mask-wearing period may be extended.

Thorwart said the word "asymptomatic" — which is used to refer to people who've had exposure to COVID-19 and so could soon develop the virus, or who have a positive COVID-19 case but no symptoms — means the same thing as "healthy" to him, informing his logic.

Within the same motion, Thorwart moved to do away with the district's public dashboard of COVID-19 cases, saying its data was "functionally meaningless."

Board members Yota Palli and Edward Tate seemed taken aback by the motion, which they'd had no prior chance to review and which had not been included on the agenda. Solicitor Robert Cox indicated, though, that voting on the matter would still be legal since the health and safety plan was up for review, and "whether it’s a good idea [to vote] is the board’s business."

Tate said he was "disappointed" in the process of introducing this motion; Palli agreed, saying, “I am also surprised that this is happening right now.”

In discussion, board member Mariann McKee expressed strong disapproval.

"I disagree with striking this language," she said, adding, "For those individuals living with a household member and being exposed to someone in their household with COVID [to then attend] school without even a mask, to me endangers more lives.”

Board members in favor of the motion felt that the dashboard has the capacity for error and promotes fear.

“I never really thought the dashboard gave us much help in everyday life," Joseph Hidalgo said. "To me it seemed more like it just made people upset.”

Board member Michael Roosevelt repeatedly asked other board members and district staff whether or not the county provides COVID-19 data — which it does on a weekly basis — and what kind it provides. He then said he did not believe it was anyone's intent in the district "to convey concern or fear."

Thorwart said he doesn't know the value of the data on Council Rock's dashboard, and that it does not provide for meaningful action by the district. Director of Special Services Charles Lambert pointed out that, the more that is done to extrapolate conclusions from data and present those, the less accurate the numbers become.

Palli, who said she has a background in statistics, agreed that there was value to sharing the case numbers, saying people naturally want to be informed about what's going on in their communities.

"I don’t see that as creating fear at this point, I see it as creating relief," she said, speaking to recent dwindling case numbers in Bucks County and in the district.

Board president Ed Salamon asked if any board members wanted to split the items into two motions, which they did not.

Thorwart said several times that the primary purpose behind his motion was to "cause a discussion." After the 6-3 vote — in which Palli, Tate, and McKee voted no — the COVID-19 dashboard which had documented cases in the district all year disappeared from the Council Rock website.

The district is still collecting data on COVID-19 cases; it's just not being shared with the public.

Cox explained that legally, the two workers hired to collect this data for Council Rock and interface with families and students must keep collecting their data because the Pennsylvania Department of Education mandates that school districts share their COVID-19 numbers "for case investigation, contact tracing, and the assurance of quarantine and/or isolation orders; and exclude school children and staff from having contact with other school children and staff showing symptoms of a communicable disease."

"That doesn’t mean we have to consolidate the data and present large numbers on a daily or weekly basis,” Hidalgo said.

During the discussion, Hidalgo and Roosevelt also said parents had contacted them with concerns about the district practice of distancing recently-positive or -exposed students during lunchtime, when students must be unmasked. Roosevelt called this public health measure "segregation."

“I would like to be able to afford [concerned] families the same level of comfort by allowing [returning asymptomatic children] to eat distanced," Lambert said in response.

After removing provisions for masking in schools after ongoing exposure or a positive test, board members again raised this question of distancing potentially contagious students.

Thorwart suggested creating "tables for the fearful" who don't want to be exposed to COVID-19.

It is unclear if that practice will be implemented, although Andrew Sanko, director of K-12 education, said there is space for some students to eat apart from others.

A representative for the Council Rock School District did not immediately respond to Patch's request for comment Monday afternoon.

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