In separate measures on Monday, Lowndes County supervisors effectively mandated mask-wearing for anyone inside county facilities and amended their policy to offer extra paid leave for employees with COVID-19 to exclude those who haven’t been vaccinated against the virus.

After lengthy discussion, the board voted to align its policies with recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Mississippi State Department of Health, allowing those policies to change as the official recommendations change without further board action. Presently, those recommendations call for mask-wearing in indoor public spaces, regardless of vaccination status, as COVID-19 cases continue to rise at record levels fueled by the heartier, more infectious Delta variant.

The board’s decision only applies to county facilities.

The COVID policy change that met the most resistance, however, was where on the spectrum supervisors would land between mandating and incentivizing county employees to be vaccinated.

No supervisor seemed to outright endorse a vaccine mandate, though District 5’s Leroy Brooks twice said he was “conflicted” on the subject and would like to revisit it at future meetings. Instead, with a 3-0 vote — District 2 supervisor and board president Trip Hairston abstained — the board voted to disqualify employees who have not received the vaccine from receiving extra paid leave if they contract the virus, unless they can produce a written medical reason why they can’t be vaccinated.

“I’m for paying people who get COVID if they are vaccinated,” Brooks said. “If they are not vaccinated and they get sick, I’m not for paying them. … “If you don’t want to get the vaccination for personal reasons, that’s fine. You don’t get the right to infect everyone else. You don’t get to run around, not wear a mask and not get vaccinated, (then) get paid when you’re at home, when you have an option.”

Supervisor Harry Sanders, of District 1, did not attend Monday’s meeting.

Through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act in 2020, the federal government funded an additional 80 hours of paid leave for public employees who had to miss work due to COVID-19. Supervisors agreed in January to pay for extending that benefit to county employees this year.

In order to receive the additional leave now, a county employee must present a vaccine card with at least one shot received or the medical excuse for not being able to take the shot. Employees who do neither, if they contract COVID-19, must use their regularly allotted sick time or take it unpaid. Those who are quarantining with a child with COVID-19 can use the additional leave benefit without the vaccine stipulation, Brooks said.

Hairston agreed with Brooks that he didn’t think willfully unvaccinated employees should receive additional paid leave if they got the virus, but he bristled at the idea of denying it due to it being “dangerous.” Initially, he asked about incentivizing employee vaccinations with gift cards, but both Brooks and board attorney Tim Hudson said that was most likely illegal since it would be considered a donation.

Still, Hairston said his reservations about placing a vaccine requirement on the extra paid leave bank might cause people to work when they are sick and spread the virus even more. Hudson offered it may even discourage those employees from getting tested for the virus.

“I worry about encouraging people to come to work, even though they haven’t been vaccinated,” Hairston said. “I need for them to stay home. We don’t need this virus spreading because they feel compelled to come to work.”

Brooks disagreed, saying employees facing the specter of taking unpaid leave would be its own incentive to be vaccinated. Even if it isn’t, he said, the onus is on the employee to demonstrate personal responsibility.

“I don’t think there are many people who would just knowingly try to infect people,” Brooks said. “I think we have to be as stern as we can to protect other people and the operation of this county. … If a person knowingly has the COVID and they come to work with the possibility of infecting someone else, hell, they need to be fired. You have to take some sense of responsibility.”

District 4 Supervisor Jeff Smith, though he ultimately voted for the measure, shared his own reservations about “putting employees in a box” without telling them explicitly they need to be vaccinated.

“I kind of know the mindset of some of these people who work out there in the field,” Smith said. “If you put them in a box, you may not always get the response you think you’re going to get. It could be counterproductive.

“You don’t have a COVID vaccination mandate for the employees, but you want to penalize them if they are not vaccinated,” he later added. “I think you want the best of both worlds, and I don’t think that exists.”

Smith, like Hairston, said he agreed with Brooks in principle and shared he and his family are fully vaccinated. He said, though, he might be willing to argue for reinstating the additional paid leave access to unvaccinated employees at the next supervisors’ meeting.

“I have no problem coming back here and bringing the same issue back up,” he said. “… If I start hearing that employees are being put in a situation that compromises them personally, because of this decision, I’m going to be in here standing on the table saying we need to change it.”

Brooks cut him off.

“Hell, Jeff, they’re compromising us,” he said. “This ain’t about them.”

Lowndes school money
In other business, the board voted in executive session to appeal a chancery court decision that will allow Lowndes County School District an extra $3 million in ad valorem tax revenue without need of a public referendum.

The board said it would authorize LCSD’s request of $27.9 million for 2021-22, even as it appeals a court decision issued earlier this month ruling the district is entitled to it. The move could raise the school district tax rate by as many as 9 mills, meaning property owners in the district would pay an additional $90 in taxes for every $100,000 of assessed property value.

Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.