Culver schools will follow state mask, vaccine mandates, delay start of school 9 days

Reluctant move, alleges state 'handing down unreasonable penalties and threats'

CULVER, Ore. (KTVZ) – The Culver School District superintendent informed families Friday that the district will reluctantly implement the state mask mandate for students and staff, and also will delay the start of school by nine days to prepare for the state’s vaccine mandate.

Superintendent Stefanie Garber said in a letter that they were two “very difficult and important decisions.”

“We apologize for headache, heartache and tension any of these mandates create,” Garber wrote. “We feel it too.”

The reluctance and opposition to the state’s rules were clear in her letter.

“We feel that all of the state agencies related to education are failing to support their numbers as they should and are handing down unreasonable penalties and threats,” Garber wrote.

“We will comply with the mandate for now, bind together with other agencies and school districts to encourage our state entities to change their approach, and look forward to better tomorrows,” she added.

Garber said the state potentially could have caused the school district to lose its liability insurance and have teachers’ licenses revoked, if it refused to follow the new requirements.

“We do not want any employee to lose their ability to provide for their family or keep their job,” Garber wrote.

On a similar note, Garber said the district will postpone the start of classes until Sept. 20 “to fully plan and prepare for staffing challenges caused by the new vaccine mandate. Our goal is to keep every employee.”

Garber said the district also expects “there will be other state mandates in the next four weeks, based on last year’s pattern,” including a possible mandate to return to distance learning – “the state told districts this week that we should be ready for it.”

“We hope COVID cases will decrease over the next four weeks,” she added.