I wonder if school board members would seriously be considering authorizing applying for waivers and opening schools, if personal legal and financial liability was extended to their decision making and they could be sued and held responsible should a child or teacher fall seriously ill after a school opened?

Can the school district be sued and held responsible for workers compensation, should a teacher become permanently and chronically ill and contact tracing leads to a clusters of cases at the school district? How many such workers compensation cases would bankrupt the school district?

I am happy to see that our district is willing to look into all options. They may decide to stay with distance learning, but at least they are considering the alternatives. Thank you to the school board and staff for doing the extra work to explore these options. And, I believe that employer liability will not be an issue. If employers such as a school district would be held liable, no one would be doing business - from restaurants to grocery stores to doctors offices to government offices. Employees everywhere are being exposed all the time. And, since the actual mode of transmission hasn't been solidly discovered yet, it would be a hard case to prove in court.

My question about personal liability wasn't intended to making an argument that liablity should be extended to boards. I was trying to illustrate that if this question causes one to pause and assess what the risk of liability would be, they should consider that the risk of injury is still present irrespective of their own personal liability.


Regarding workers compensation, workers compensation claims are already being filed throughout the state of California related to Covid-19.

Web Link

"Workers’ compensation claims for COVID-19 have spiked dramatically in the past two months, from about 4,700 in May to about 10,900 in June and more than 11,600 in July, according to data from the California Department of Industrial Relations, which oversees the program.

Those claims could mean more than $2 billion in costs for employers and their insurers, according to projections by the Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau of California"