The Cullman City Board of Education is asking the court to dismiss a petition for emergency injunction brought by Brian Ogstad regarding the school system’s COVID-19 procedures and communications.

Ogstad filed the petition for an emergency injunction against the Cullman City School System last month, saying the COVID-19 pandemic does not constitute a public health emergency and demanding the system not promote the use of masks and vaccines to prevent the virus.

He asked the court for an immediate halt to the city school system’s current COVID-19 procedures, including discussing COVID-19, encouraging the use of masks, promoting vaccinations and permitting onsite vaccinations at the school.

In its response filed Thursday, the school system said the board and its members are protected by the Alabama Constitution from the suit, citing Alabama’s sovereign immunity clause which says the state, which includes local boards of education, “shall never be made a defendant in any court of law or equity.”

Ogstad’s complaint also names the board members individually, but the school system’s response says they, too, are covered by sovereign immunity because they are acting in good faith in their official capacities.

“Even if vaccines were administered on Board property, which they are not, there is no legal prohibition of permitting such vaccinations,” the motion to dismiss filed by the school system says. “There are no facts asserted in the Petition which support a finding that the Defendants acted fraudulently, in bad faith, beyond their authority, or in a mistaken interpretation of law. Instead the actions of the Defendants fall within their discretionary authority in managing the Cullman City Schools.”

The motion, filed by attorney Taylor P. Brooks for the school board, also says Ogstad doesn’t have a claim against the board. “Plaintiff does not assert a violation of any constitutional rights, statutory law, or any common law cause of action. Rather, he merely asserts that the Defendants have a mask policy and have engaged in communications about vaccines and COVID-19 with which he does not agree,” it says.

The Cullman City School System currently does not require staff members or students to wear masks while at school, but does recommend mask use by anyone who feels more comfortable wearing them.

Ogstad has previously appeared at meetings of the Cullman City School Board and the Cullman City Council to speak out against the procedures that have been put in place to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

At the school board’s July 13 meeting, he claimed masks contain harmful toxins that are harming children, and said the school system should refuse any state or federal orders to require mask usage.

“I wasn’t loud enough last year, and I knew it then, so I apologize for that,” he said. “This year, I promise you, if they try to force us to wear masks again, I would say ‘No.’”

The motion to dismiss Ogstad’s petition notes that “there is no credible argument that masking or promotion of vaccines would cause any immediate irreparable harm to anyone. Quite the opposite, the ADPH and CDC have determined that these actions save lives.”