FHSAA reverses course, votes to delay start of fall sports until August 24

The fall sports practice, which was approved to start on July 27, will now start no earlier than August 24. If there is a two week practice window, games will be allowed first the week of September 7th.

Summer conditioning workouts can continue.

The FHSAA voted 10-5 Monday night to keep the start date July 27, an unrealistic goal for most of the state.

The consequences of their Monday vote to keep the calendar the same had continued throughout the week as numerous school districts across the state delayed the start dates of practices and expressed disappointment that the advisory committee report of medicine will be largely discarded.

Locally, Alachua, Clay, Columbia, Flagler, Nassau, and St. Johns have delayed their fall sports practice start dates. Duval had not announced a start date, but was expected to do so.

Board member Chris Patricca put it bluntly at the start of the second meeting in the past four days: “I don’t see a way forward for these two sports in the fall.” [football and volleyball]. “

That led to a meeting that went down a winding road, with Wewahitchkha coach Bobby Johns speaking in favor of allowing schools to start when they see fit, the first day being July 27. That is the measure that was approved on Monday.

“It is a huge overreach on our part when we start telling each school district how they should deal with their student population,” he said.

The SMAC medical report that was discussed but downplayed at Monday’s meeting was central and Thursday night.

FHSAA board chairwoman-elect Lauren Otero said 359 of 396 public schools in 47 of the state’s 67 districts have delayed start dates.

Mayo Clinic Jacksonville’s Dr. Jennifer Maynard presented data Monday in the SMAC report that encouraged delaying the initiation of high-risk sports such as soccer and volleyball due and reevaluating the COVID-19 data after the start of schools. .

Maynard said data from the World Health Organization suggested a 10% guideline to reopen and another suggestion to wait until positivity reaches 3% to reopen. Maynard said he suggested the 5% positivity number as a return to sports. Those numbers would have to be true for a 28-day period in the counties.