AUBURN — The School Committee voted unanimously Wednesday to adopt an optional masking policy  March 9 in response to new Maine Center for Disease Control guidelines released earlier in the day.

The two School Committee members who are on the health and safety subcommittee, which recommended the district continue universal masking for another two weeks, approved the policy change.

The recommendation from the 10-person subcommittee — which includes school staff, district officials and medical personnel — was created Tuesday night, before the CDC released its new guidance.

Beginning March 9, the state will no longer recommend that masks be worn in schools and child care centers.

The subcommittee’s primary concern was moving to optional masking too quickly and later needing to backtrack if cases begin rising again.

Auburn Mayor Jason Levesque made the motion to propose optional masking.

“If this entire pandemic we have been always following the recommendations as rule from CDC, we can’t go back and look at their recommendation now to end masking and say ‘no, we’re not going to follow your recommendation,’ when we have always followed their recommendation,” Levesque said. 

This statement helped convince committee members to vote in favor of the policy change.

The superintendent will retain the power to reinstate mandatory masking for all students and staff if COVID-19 conditions change.

One challenge identified by the subcommittee that was not unaddressed was the state requirement that students wear a mask for five days after returning from COVID-19 quarantine.

Subcommittee members expressed concerns for maintaining student confidentiality while enforcing the policy, particularly in the middle and high schools where students move from class to class each day.

During public comment, four people implored the School Committee to change the masking policy. No one present spoke in defense of the policy.

One speaker, John Stark, who has spoken at public comment during previous meetings, told the School Committee he would next see them in court if they didn’t roll back the mask mandate.

Numerous other school districts, including Lewiston and Augusta, have also voted to make masks optional.

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