>Or it means that the public official is just virtue signaling that they aren't a big fan of masks.

If they're virtue signaling then by definition they're showing support for whatever the locally accepted opinion already is.

That opinion doesn't have to be widely locally accepted. You have no idea how many people support it - whether it's 20% of the population, 40% of the population, or 80% of the population.

They could have made this decision the other way, and your arguments, when used in defense of it would be just as sound.

It's quite possible to be virtue signaling to a minority. Just because you're an administrator in a public service doesn't mean that you are actually doing what the community wants you to do - especially when there are limited ways of removing you.

It's even possible that the minority you are virtue signaling to is politicians and insiders - who actually have ways of removing you. It would be incredibly stupid of you to not do what they want.

>that opinion doesn't have to be widely locally accepted.

You're not technically wrong but it would be monumentally stupid to do for this particular opinion.

>It's quite possible to be virtue signaling to a minority.

And it's moronic for an elected official to do that if the nature of the signal will absolutely enrage a majority or a different larger minority which "a mask is a personal choice" most certainly does.

Exactly what the school doesn't want, all the political consequence falling on them even though health experts coordinating over data should be the ones making the call at higher levels of government.