Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon had already sent a letter to New York state requesting specific metrics for when to implement and end COVID-19 mitigation efforts in schools.

Hearing none, McMahon on Tuesday said on Twitter that the state should drop the face coverings requirement and leave it up to the individual school districts and communities.

“If you can’t put a metric forward, I don’t believe you can justify the mandate,” McMahon said at a COVID-19 briefing on Wednesday.

Gov. Kathy Hochul in the last week has said she plans to re-evaluate masks in schools with the Department of Health come the return of students from winter break.

But McMahon said without any metrics, waiting another few weeks makes little sense.

“When you’re in the midst of the public health emergency, you have to look at everything and balance on the side of the public health emergency. This is not an emergency at this point. This is something that is serious and we’ve built up infrastructure to address,” said McMahon.

McMahon said he believes hospitalization numbers would be a key metric in any exit strategy for masking in schools, saying hospital capacity determines the county’s ability to care for the sick.

He also said the existing testing structure for schools would be another key metric.

“If we see something in one of them, we go in to test even more than the sample, so I think that’s an approach we take moving forward,” said McMahon.

McMahon is joined by more than 20 county districts in asking the state to revisit and revise masking in schools.

In a letter sent to the governor, state health commissioner and Department of Education commissioner, the districts asked for some formal exit strategy “from the pandemic” so the schools could return to normalcy.

"Our educators, students and parents note a variety of challenges that masks present in the learning environment related to speech and language development, public presentation skills, interpersonal skills and pro-social interaction," the letter reads.

Andy Pallotta, the president of New York State United Teachers, also issued a statement.

“We appreciate that the governor is closely analyzing the scientific data public health experts rely on to make informed health and safety decisions," he said. "A return to some normalcy is an exciting prospect, and we anxiously await the experts’ guidance for how to balance that with public health concerns after winter break.”

“This is a virus that’s going to be with us, so how do we live with this, how do we move forward? I think that’s what we’re trying to balance right now,” said McMahon.