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Trustees for the North East Independent School District approved a compensation package Monday that largely aligns with the new school funding law House Bill 2.
The law gives districts a relatively robust allotment to boost the salaries of experienced classroom teachers, and a smaller allotment for support staff. NEISD leaders told trustees the law's targeted funding limits their ability to give raises to other employees, including counselors, nurses, and librarians.
NEISD’s compensation package gives the district’s current teachers raises of $1,000 to $5,000 depending on experience. A few hourly employee categories like instructional assistants, bus drivers, custodians, and police officers are also getting targeted raises to make the district more competitive.
All other employees, including everyone else paid on the teacher scale, will get a 1% raise on the midpoint of their salary scale. For counselors, nurses and librarians, that comes out to a $615 raise.
Employees getting a 1% raise will also get a one-time 1.5% retention bonus in November.
During a presentation to the board on June 9, Susie Lackorn, NEISD's executive director of finance and accounting, told trustees the new school funding law will give the district about $17 million for raises for experienced teachers, but only about $2.5 million for raises for other staff.
“This is a balance where we're weighing stewardship and staff,” Lackorn said. “We're using some of the additional funds to do more than what's required by HB 2, but we're saving some of those additional funds to help with the deficit.”
In addition to the $19.6 million NEISD officials estimated they’ll be required to spend on raises under HB 2, Lackorn said the district plans to spend another $3.6 million in new money they expect to receive from HB 2.
“You can see where [state lawmakers] prioritize putting money,” Superintendent Sean Maika added. “And so, what we were trying to do is strike a balance between doing something for folks and also offsetting our deficit.”
Next year’s budget forecast predicts NEISD will have an $18 million deficit, down from the nearly $28 million deficit forecast for the school year that wrapped up.
Before the vote on the compensation package Monday, Board Vice President Terri Chidgey said trustees were thrilled to give teachers raises, but they also wished they had the ability to give more of a raise to other staff.
“We want to give everybody one, and the state has tied our hands,” Chidgey said. “I hope that the librarians and the counselors and the nurses and the bus drivers and the principals and the paras and so forth know that we do care about them, and we would like to give them raises, but our hands are very tied. And so, if you don't like it, I think you need to vote differently.”
In districts with at least 5,000 students like NEISD, HB 2’s Teacher Retention Allotment funds a raise of $2,500 for teachers with three or four years of experience, and a raise of $5,000 for teachers with at least five years of experience.
NEISD is also giving teachers with one year of experience a raise of $1,000 and teachers with two years of experience $1,500 to avoid compressing the pay scale.
Nurses, librarians, and counselors are on the same pay scale as teachers, and they usually receive the same raises. But HB 2 does not provide funding for them.
Maika told trustees it represented a “big, significant shift” from the state, narrowing the focus of where they want to target funding.
“If anybody was able to watch when House Bill 2 was signed into law, Gov. [Greg] Abbott was at a table, and the sign in front didn't say ‘teachers, nurses, librarians and counselors.’ That said, ‘Teachers matter.’ It was very clear that those four didn’t exist anymore,” Maika said.
The 2019 school funding bill directed money for raises to all four employees on the teacher pay scale, but the new law only provided funding for experienced teachers.
Maika estimated that three quarters of NEISD’s teachers have at last five years of experience, allowing them to receive the largest raise available.
NEISD’s starting pay will be $57,500 next year, nearly $3,000 less than other Bexar County districts like San Antonio ISD. But administrators said they are competitive when the entire compensation package is taken into account. There will be no increase in health insurance costs at NEISD next year.
NEISD trustees are slated to vote on next year’s budget Thursday. Maika and the finance department are recommending the board approve a $626 million general fund budget, which would generate a nearly $42 million deficit.
However, administrators don’t expect to spend the full adopted budget amount due to unfilled vacancies and other cost-saving measures. They forecast spending about $602 million, leaving them with a deficit of $18 million and enough money in reserves to cover 3.2 months of operations.
During the June 9 budget presentation, Trustee Diane Sciba Villarreal asked if NEISD would have enough in reserves in future years. The current forecast estimates the district’s reserves, called a fund balance, will be down to 2.1 months by the 2027-2028 school year.
“Correct me if I'm wrong, but you have to have what fund balance before TEA comes in and starts screaming?” Villarreal asked.
“They start getting really nervous once you drop below two. I'll point out that this time last year that 27-28 number was 1.3 months. So, we are getting better,” Lackorn said.
Maika added that the forecasts assume NEISD will be continuing to operate as it is now.
“My point is there's going to be things that we are doing,” Maika said.
On Monday, Maika went a step further, saying he was proud of the board for all the steps they’ve taken to shrink the deficit in recent years.
NEISD trustees voted to close three schools earlier this year, and the district has been cutting central office positions for several years.
Last year trustees approved a budget with a nearly $63 million deficit, but they expect to end the current fiscal year with a much lower deficit of $27.8 million.
“I'm so proud of the district and the board for understanding that the rescue [from state lawmakers] wasn't coming. So, we've been doing the things that we've had to do,” Maika said.
“There's still work to go, right? And we know that the flexibility that we've enjoyed as school districts for a long time is phasing out, so we're having to recalibrate and readjust. But we're in a position — we're not going to survive this. That is not my goal, folks. We are going to thrive in this industry,” Maika said. “It's going to hurt. It always does, but we are going to figure out a way to thrive in this new era.”
Instead of giving districts a funding increase through an increase in the base amount of spending per student, called the basic allotment, the new funding law dictates how the new funding will be spent through directed allotments. Critics said that limits districts’ ability to spend the money where it is most needed.
But whether or not districts like it, Maika told trustees he expects the days when lawmakers will increase the basic allotment are over.
