Texas Public Schools cannot pay their August bills. Moving the 2013-14 funding over from September
to August will cause a shortage of funding for 2013-14 public education programs.
TEXAS AFT LEGISLATIVE HOTLINE
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6, 2013
* Negative Achievement--Texas Senate Expends $1.75 Billion to Change a Payment Date to School Districts, While Restoring Zero Dollars for Public Schools
* Senate and House Budget Writers Differ on State Contributions to TRS Pensions—Further Moves Hinted
Texas Senate’s Negative Achievement--$1.75 Billion Expended, Zero School Funding Restored: The Texas Senate on Tuesday accomplished a rare feat. It managed to pass a supplemental spending bill, HB 10, bearing $1.75 billion for school districts, without using a single dime of it to restore school funding that was severely cut in 2011.
Senators led by Finance Committee chair Tommy Williams (R-The Woodlands) decided that rather than restore funding to schools it was more important to use that sum to advance the date of the last monthly delivery of state aid for the current fiscal year. The effect: School districts receive the payment in late August rather than early September. Districts are going to get the money either way, and switching the payment date clearly is not an urgent matter, as the expert staff of the Legislative Budget Board had testified in committee. But switching the payment back into August has a consequential side-effect. It takes $1.75 billion off the table that could otherwise be spent to restore funding for something that is urgently needed—full-day pre-kindergarten, for example, or the Student Success Initiative program of extra help for students struggling to pass state exams, just to name two vital programs that were all but wiped out by the 2011 budget cuts.
A statement by the Texas Forward revenue coalition, in which Texas AFT is an active participant, described the Senate’s negative achievement this way:
"Just changing a payment date by a few days does nothing to strengthen education for our students now. Instead, the bill focuses on something that is not an urgent priority--readjusting an accounting gimmick—rather than investing in proven solutions we know can improve education for future generations.
“The following are examples of urgently needed restorations of public school funding the Texas Legislature should prioritize before it ties up resources merely to reset the clock on a budgeting gimmick:
• fully fund the Student Success Initiative, to ensure that more than 120,000 students who have failed to pass state-mandated exams have the extra instruction and support they need to succeed ($300 million);
• restore funding to community colleges ($87 million);
• restore funding grants for Pre-K for over 100,000 students ($200 million).”
On the Senate floor Tuesday, Sen. Wendy Davis (D-Fort Worth) did briefly offer an HB 10 amendment to restore at least $400 million to school districts, using an additional pot of available revenue. In the process, Davis made a strong case against the refusal of Senate leaders to use huge piles of available revenue to restore the full $5.4 billion cut last session. In the face of what appeared to be bipartisan resistance from Finance Committee members, however, she eventually withdrew the amendment, at least until another supplemental spending bill comes along later in the session.
HB 10 now goes back to the House, which seems poised to accept the Senate's version of the bill. One reason for haste is that the bill also provides $4.5 billion to pay bills owed to health-care providers under the state Medicaid program coming due in a matter of weeks. That portion of HB 10 truly does meet an urgent need. Hence lawmakers are loath to do anything that would slow passage of the bill.
TRS Contribution Rates Differ in Senate and House Budget Drafts, Amid Hints of Further Change: The Senate Finance Committee this afternoon voted to keep the state contribution rate to the Teacher Retirement System pension fund at 6.4 percent for fiscal year 2014 (beginning this September) while boosting it to 6.7 percent for fiscal year 2015. House budget writers on an education-spending subcommittee previously voted for a 6.6-percent state contribution rate for both years of the coming biennium. Texas AFT considers both proposals insufficient. The right move would be to approve the TRS budget request for a two-step increase in the state contribution rate, to 6.9 percent in fiscal 2014 and to 7.4 percent in fiscal 2015.
The TRS pension fund is in good shape, but raising the state contribution rate substantially is the key to making a long-overdue cost-of-living increase for retirees feasible sooner rather than later. However, there was a fresh hint today that other changes in state laws on TRS pension contributions--and benefits—may be pursued instead. Sen. Robert Duncan (R-Lubbock), chair of the Senate State Affairs Committee with jurisdiction over TRS and a key player on the Finance Committee, said today’s decision on the contribution rate leaves the Senate with more work to do on TRS issues.
Duncan’s comment called to mind a February 21 TRS staff presentation to system trustees reporting that efforts to raise the eligibility age for full retirement benefits to 62 were “gaining traction” at the legislature. Attempts to impose higher contribution rates on active employees for both the TRS pension fund and the TRS-Care plan for retired school employees also cannot be ruled out. There has been talk as well of curtailing TRS-Care eligibility for retirees under 65, who are not yet eligible for Medicare.
Texas AFT has a better idea for lawmakers: Step up and meet the state’s neglected obligations instead of trying to shift still more costs onto active and retired school employees. You can expect to hear more from us soon on this topic.
Texas AFT represents more than 65,000 teachers, paraprofessionals, support personnel, and higher-education employees across the state. Texas AFT is affiliated with the 1.5-million-member American Federation of Teachers.
