Defending Our Schools

In an effort to balance the budget on Wednesday March 16, the House Finance Committee cleared Senate Bill 76, which would require teachers to pay a greater share of their retirement costs. While the measure would save the state an estimated $61.6 million, Democrats opposed the bill because teachers, school employees, and the school districts were not given a chance to weigh in on the proposal.

Initially, the bill intended to increase the teacher pension contribution rate by 2.5 percent, while decreasing the state’s contribution by a corresponding 2.5 percent. But an amendment by Republican Brian Delgrosso would also allow schools districts to increase the contribution rate by yet another 2 percent.

I strongly oppose both this bill and Rep. Delgrosso’s amendment. Clearly, we need to balance the budget. We must prevent teacher layoffs and keep our class sizes from growing. But we cannot resolve our budgetary problems on the backs of our teachers and school employees. These people are the foundation of our state’s health. We must search for new and innovative ways to balance the budget, and not punish the schools for doing their job.