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Cattaraugus County families sue Cuomo over COVID restrictions

Five Cattaraugus County residents have filed an Article 78 lawsuit against Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Dr. Howard Zucker, state health commissioner, alleging COVID-19 pandemic measures have infringed on their constitutional rights.

Plaintiffs are Shana Chudy of Great Valley, Sidney Earley and Dawn Rowland of Great Valley, Heather Earley of Randolph and John Pfeiffer of Ellicottville. Specifically, the families allege violations of the First Amendment rights of free assembly and free speech, Fifth Amendment rights of due process, Fourteenth Amendment right of privacy as set forth in Roe v. Wade and medical rights included in the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act passed by Congress in 1996.

They are represented by Carl Schwartz Jr. of Penn Yan. Schwartz is representing Monroe County business owners, landlords, teachers, parents and performing artists in a similar lawsuit that also takes aim at Monroe County officials. Earlier this year, Schwartz won a lawsuit against the state Health Department allowing his son to return to Creekside Monroe One BOCES in Fairport, overruling a state order.

The five plaintiffs have a variety of issues with the way executive orders have affected their families. Chudy says her children, who attend Ellicottville Central School, have lost access to the use of gyms and stages, which has had a “real and quantifiable detrimental impact to the physical and mental health of the family” while Chudy says she has not been able to effectively teach her kindergarten students because she lacks internet service at home. She also says her father had a stroke, and the lack of visitation set back his recovery.

Sidney Earley alleges her children are having headaches from having to wear masks all day long at school, that the state’s actions have forced her family to pay more for day care, that the governor’s moratoriums on evictions has hurt her financially. Rowland says her college- and school-age children have had their mental and physical health affected by not having access to athletic events and gyms. Heather Earley says she and her children have suffered damages because it has been nearly impossible to fulfill her teaching duties while also teaching her own children. She also alleges she and her children have been harmed by limits on church attendance. Pfeiffer alleges his children are not being provided the necessary education because his children are only in school two days a week as well as disagreeing to the lack of gym access and athletic games being canceled.

In addition to making the general argument that doctors have found children aren’t spreading COVID-19 as was originally feared and that schools have tended to be safe, the families argue that protocols for children who are sick with something other than COVID-19 have infringed on families’ lives, as has contact tracing.

“Despite the evidence of how limited the threat has become to the public at large and to children, in particular, the defendants have intensified the protocols for students attending schools such that even the most minor medical symptoms result in students missing their schooling as they are forced to be evaluated by a health care provider or forced not to return to school for 10 days,” the lawsuit states. “Additionally, if a student does not get evaluated or tested, the defendants have mandated that the school deem the student to be COVID-19 positive and then contact the health department to begin the contact tracing process. This is an egregious violation of normal medical diagnostic practice and of a patient’s rights to privacy with regard to their health status. The disregard this mandate shows for diagnostic principles and patient autonomy illustrates in bold relief the irrational zeal the defendants have applied to the COVID-19 issue at the expense of reason and citizens’ rights.”

The families are asking for the state to allow local school districts to make any rules to safeguard the full return of students to schools and prevent the state from instituting any rules, including contact tracing, leaving further rulemaking to the state Legislature. A similar remedy is requested for colleges and universities. The lawsuit also seeks to prevent further restrictions on churches, performance halls or athletic events or from instituting safety rules that weren’t in place prior to COVID-19. The lawsuit also seeks to prevent the state from limiting access to family members in nursing homes and hospitals and to allow college students to travel home as they see fit. Lastly, the lawsuit seeks a court’s declaration that the state has overstepped the authority given to it by the state Legislature and to end the state’s emergency powers.

The state has faced hundreds of lawsuits over its handling of COVID-19, including a recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that barred New York from enforcing certain limits on attendance at churches and synagogues in areas designated as hard hit by the virus. Many lawsuits, though, have upheld the state’s emergency actions.

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