Sonoma County schools last among North Bay counties to return to campus

No food in the classroom. All students must wear masks. Four to six feet of social distance at all times. They were all key components to a deal struck between Ukiah Unified teachers and the school district to begin returning teachers, staff and students to modified in-person instruction this month.

But apart from the crucial decline in daily coronavirus cases in Mendocino County, the biggest piece of that agreement, according to both sides, was widespread, targeted vaccinations for school staff.

“Huge,” teachers union president Terry d’Selkie said. “It was probably the No. 1 thing. … I really think that changed everything.”

The announcement that Mendocino County schools are preparing to reopen next week has left Sonoma County alone among its neighbors as the last county with no clear timetable to return students to campus in large numbers.

Sonoma County’s 68,000 school kids have been learning from home since the coronavirus took hold in mid-March. Stuck in purple, the most restrictive tier of the state’s reopening plan and indicative of widespread transmission of the virus, Sonoma County has watched students in Napa, Marin, Lake and now Mendocino reach critical thresholds that allow for a return to in-person learning.

One of the key thresholds: reducing a county’s adjusted 7-day case rate per 100,000 residents below 25 for five days straight. Hitting that mark is a critical milestone before prekindergarten to sixth grade students can return to campuses in a modified format.

Sonoma County reached that marker Monday, according to public heath officials, the same day the Sonoma County Office of Education launched a vaccination clinic that is targeting school employees and day care providers among others.

Once there, districts must also submit a number of COVID-19 safety plans, which are subject to approval by both county health and state officials. In Sonoma County, 15 such documents were under review Monday, according to county public health officials.

The sheer number of districts, and therefore safety plans, is one factor that makes Sonoma County difficult to compare with its neighbors, said Steve Herrington, the Sonoma County superintendent of schools.

Sonoma County has 40 individual school districts for 68,000 students. By comparison, Mendocino has 12 districts for about 13,000 students, Lake County has six for approximately 9,850 students, Napa has five for 20,000 students, and Marin has 19 for about 33,500 students.

All 40 school districts in the county are working on safety plans for the state Department of Public Health and Cal/OSHA, (Division of Occupational Safety and Health), Herrington said.

“With 175 schools it’s going to take you a little longer to get them approved. Each plan has to have a site plan and districts have to adopt that,” Herrington said.

And Sonoma County, which has never left the purple tier, has struggled more than neighboring counties to quell the spread of the virus.

Napa County, for example, had advanced to the orange tier in the state’s reopening plan, indicating moderate spread of the coronavirus. Because it reached the orange tier before the state renewed restrictions, Napa schools that were open before cases surged were allowed to stay open.

St. Helena Unified School District is now serving 93% of its students in-person five days a week, according to the Napa County Office of Education. Napa Valley Unified is moving from a hybrid schedule to in-person classes four days a week March 1. Howell Mountain District is in-person full-time, Pope Valley is in person with a reduced hourly schedule and Calistoga Joint Unified is on a distance-only schedule.

Additionally, the vast majority of school employees have received the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine, a Napa County Office of Education spokeswoman said.

In Lake County, 65% to 70% of kindergarten through 12th grade educators have chosen to be vaccinated. Two of the county’s six school districts, in addition to Lake County Office of Education programs, are offering in-person instruction with a distance learning option. The county is in the purple tier, like Sonoma County, but every district in the county is offering in-person instruction for high-risk students, according to a Lake County Office of Education spokesperson.

As Mendocino County advances, Ukiah Unified, which accounts for nearly half of the county’s approximately 13,000 students, is leading the charge. The district is eyeing a phased-in return, focused on transitional kindergarten through second grades, starting Feb. 16. Fort Bragg Unified and Leggett Valley, which together have about 2,000 pupils, have also submitted reopening plans to state and county authorities.

But for many, vaccines proved a turning point, said Mendocino County Superintendent of Schools Michelle Hutchins.

“The vaccines did make teachers feel more secure coming into the classroom. It would anyone. So it absolutely did play a part,” she said.

And it was a strategic move by the county public health department and public health officer Dr. Andrew Coren, she said. “It was ’shots in arms,’” Hutchins said.

“This was back a few weeks, before the tightening up a little bit on the supply,” she said. “He gave us a certain amount of slots and he told us to fill them with educators. We were able to vaccinate any educator who wanted it.”

On Monday, Sonoma County began a targeted vaccination clinic run by the county Office of Education and aimed at inoculating 17,200 school employees, day care providers, preschool workers and other educators. But with supply of the vaccine limited, it is unclear how long it will take to give each educator two doses. About 1,100 shots are expected to be administered this week.

And the vaccination effort comes as Gov. Gavin Newsom and the head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have said that inoculations are not required to reopen schools.

On Tuesday, Newsom said there are not enough doses to vaccinate every teacher and school employee in California before the conclusion of the current academic year. Access to vaccine is a key issue in negotiations between Newsom and legislative leaders to reopen elementary schools. A deal could emerge later this week, the governor told reporters Tuesday in Santa Clara.

The widespread vaccination of teachers was not part of the return-to-school agreement inked by the Ukiah Unified School District and the teachers union, d’Selkie said. But it proved crucial regardless.

“That wasn’t even in our MOU (memorandum of understanding),” she said. “We felt that it was not in our best interest to hold this up. Many people were ready to get back and I think they would be upset if the union was the whole entire reason we weren’t going back.”

Even with the inoculation, people do have anxiety about returning to what feels like the unknown, d’Selkie said. She counts herself among them.

“I’m nervous,” she said. “How can you not be nervous? I’m ready to retire. I’m in that age, that vulnerable window.”

You can reach Staff Writer Kerry Benefield at 707-526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @benefield.