Debate Rages Over Fall Sports Decision
/The Clay County Public Health Center (CCPHC) released a statement today on social media in response to the Missouri State High School Activities Association’s (MSHSAA) decision regarding fall sports amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Let Them Play Initiative Gains Momentum
The post stated that, “the Missouri State High School Activities Association announced Thursday that they are offering spring season options for sports. This provides an excellent opportunity for student athletes to enjoy a full high school experience that would otherwise be disrupted this fall due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.”
In a response to the MSHSAA statement, and the flurry of social media protests by parents and fans, Clay County Public Health says there are no meetings scheduled by the board of health to discuss or make a decision or public health order to cancel or eliminate sports.
Parents and fans appear to have drawn a line over COVID-19 restrictions. Nearly 50 responses were made to the Health Center’s social media statement in the first hour of publication. A change.org petition called: Let Them Play in Clay County, MO garnered over 3,500 signatures.
People were wildly speculating that a secret or emergency meeting by health department officials was going to occur today at or before noon. There was so much speculation that people were contacting Mayor Randy Pogue asking about details about Clay County mandates.
In response to the uproar, Mayor Pogue released a Facebook statement trying to quell the situation saying: “I have received calls, emails, and messages regarding a possible meeting tomorrow regarding the fate of fall sports in Clay County, Missouri. I’m not here to speak for the Clay County Public Health Center, but what I can tell you is I’m not aware of this supposed meeting. Gary and his staff have done a fantastic job keeping in contact with me. My assumption is if a serious decision was going to be made tomorrow, I would know about it and had the opportunity to discuss with Gary direct. Please remember that during these trying times, to only trust and share information from reliable sources.”
The Clay County Public Health Center concluded its post by giving the decision to local school districts by saying, “Any decision to offer a spring season is ultimately the responsibility of each individual local school district to make.” CCPHC is recommending that school districts choose the MSHSAA spring season options for contact sports.
The Kearney School District issued this statement Friday afternoon: "The statement put out by the Clay County Public Health Center is also new to us, so as we're finding out about it we're working to have discussions to look at those recommendations and see how we feel we need to move forward within Kearney," said Communications Specialist Sonja Love. "We completely understand the importance of having those fall programs, and we want students to have those opportunities as well. We just want to be able to do it in the safest possible way. I've talked to Dr. Miller, Jeff Morrison and Dave Schwartzenbach and we're talking about the next steps forward."
KPGZ News - Brian Watts contributed to this story
