Failed 2023 Texas Ed Bills and Those Waiting On Abbott’s Signature
Hello SAISD Parents and San Antonio Community Members,
Good News our 88th Texas Legislation Session ended at midnight on May 29th. These past five months have been one the busiest, with more education bills than any other session. Parents, please keep in mind that every session, bills are filed they go through a process, and then they’re debated and amended over twenty times before they pass or fail. The method of passing a bill is a challenging task, and at times, it can seem impossible.
No Raises For Texas Teachers
So, as most of you know, HB100 didn’t pass, which means our teachers will not receive a raise. In addition, our public schools will not get any new funding because the Senate Education Committee took a list of funding and created a mess in that one bill which is now 133 pages. It seems that our Senators held all the funding as hostages to get the school vouchers for private schools. The idea that these Senators were willing to make our teachers and public schools beg for desperately needed funding is sickening. I don’t think that they would appreciate us holding their paycheck hostage.
The list of educational bills that have been sent to our Governor’s desk is long. SB17; which is the bill that would ban tenure; SB763 which would allow school districts to employ or allow volunteer chaplains to perform the duties of school counselors; SB 29 prohibits our cities from requiring or mandating that a person has to wear a mask to prevent the spread of COVID-19 this applies to private business, public, open-enrollment charter or private schools; SB1720 will allow school employees who report a potential threat to the school’s threat assessment team to keep their identity confidential. These bills are sitting on our Governor’s desk, waiting to see if he will sign them into law. The one bill that we’re hoping he will sign into law is SB10, which would give our retired teachers an adjustment in their retirement. The bill has certain adjustments for retired teachers using the year they retired. Retired teachers that are 75 and older will get a $7,500 check. Those between 70 and 74 will get a $2,400 check. Then a two percent adjustment for teachers who retired in 2013-2020 and four percent for those that retired in 2001-2013. Those teachers who retired before 2001 will get a six percent adjustment. If signed, it would be the first cost-of-living adjustment in 30 years. Now the process of the Governor signing a bill can be long so all we can do now is wait and see what happens.
Property Taxes and School Choice
At the end of the session SB1515 that would require all of our classrooms to have a framed copy of the Ten Commandments- this bill did not pass along with SB 1446, which would have placed administrative burdens on TRS, and SB1861 which would have expanded the virtual education network into ISD’s. These bills like others failed during the session due to shady deals that our Senators had this session. Now, there still a huge debate over property taxes and school vouchers. This past Friday the Governor stated that he will call for a future special session to deal with “school choice” but didn’t mention when exactly that would happen. The bigger issue for our Governor is the property taxes and during his speech he made this statement “We must dream big, dream the possibility that we can eliminate property taxes in Texas,” so if that happens where would the funding for public schools come from in Texas?
As this session wrapped up, the House and Senators now have to deal with the Attorney General Paxton impeachment trial. We will see if Governor Abbott will call for a special session.
To see a full list of approved and failed bills visit saobserver.com.
If anyone has questions our concerns please email me at lena.lopez@saobserver.com.
Have a Blessed Week,
Lena Lopez
