August 7, 2020 3:00pm — At his daily coronavirus press briefing in Little Rock, Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson says he is requesting $20 million from state Cares Act Funding be allocated to COVID-19 emergency leave to teachers and support staff. He expects the request to be presented to the Arkansas Cares Act Steering Committee for approval in the coming days.
“COVID emergency leave has been a common topic, with teachers and staff, worried they will have to take to use personal leave,” said Arkansas Secretary of Education, Johnny Key. The funding will be available to teachers, support staff, bus drivers, custodial, medical, and cafeteria workers through the school calendar year. Leave formula is based on an overestimation of daily positive community cases, and public school salaries, Key says.
Hutchinson says if a major coronavirus outbreaks occurs at a public school, on-site instruction will transition to virtual learning.
Characterizing Friday as “not a good day,” the Governor announced 1,011 new positive COVID-19 cases in Arkansas, for a total of 48,039 cases since March. Coronavirus, however, is not out of control, he says, because the overall trend line remains flat. Nine new hospitalizations have occurred, for a total of 523, and 6 new deaths, for a total of 521. In addition, 6,024 tests were conducted over the past 24 hour period.
Presently Arkansas has 7,158 active cases, with 53 in nursing homes, 638 in correctional facilities, and the remainder in the community. Sebastian County has 43 cases, 41 in Washington County and 32 in Benton County. The seven-day rolling average for positive cases continues to be above 10 percent. On Friday 805 Arkansans were counted as recovered for a total of 40,360.
Hutchinson announced he has signed an executive order allowing registered voters with COVID-related concerns to cite that as sufficient reason for requesting an absentee ballot.
“Requests for absentee ballots have increased dramatically,” he says. At the request of county clerks, the Governor is also allowing ballots to be sorted earlier than normal, unopened, for processing on election day.
Hutchinson reported attending the Council of Governor’s meeting in Washington, D.C. on Thursday, which he co-chairs. He says sources with the U.S. Department of Defense and Health and Human Services announced acceleration of commercial test lab productivity across all states.
