The Senate Committee on Education met to take up pending business. They took up HB 3 (Huberty/Bettencourt) school finance legislation and voted it out as substituted with 8 ayes and 3 present not voting. Chair Taylor commented that deliberation on the floor will occur Friday May 3, 2019.
This report is intended to give you an overview and highlight of the discussions on the various topics the committee took up. It is not a verbatim transcript of the hearing, but is based upon what was audible or understandable to the observer and the desire to get details out as quickly as possible with few errors or omissions.
HB 3 (Huberty/Taylor) school finance bill
- Taylor laid out the substitute
- Noted they are a bit faster on the schedule than originally planned
- Highlighted a few differences not many substantive changes made:
- Clerical lege council corrections made
- Clarify commissioner must adopt at least one alternative third-grade reading assessment besides STAAR.
- By the 2022-23 school year, the STAAR would be moved entirely online with shorter, more frequent administrations to assess where students are at several points in the school year (beginning, middle and end of year).
- Corrected a drafting error to small and mid-size adjustments as formulas had been inverted
- P-TECH funding set aside is subtracted from total state wide CTE allotment
- Clarifies CCR Military readiness funding is a bonus based on performance outcomes rather than allotment
- Compensatory education funding – based on census block group
- Directs TEA to work with THECB to develop FAFSA opt out form vs every school come up with a form
- Creates a set aside for blended learning grants
Questions
- West – just got draft TEA runs, well want to go over with Von before it gets to the floor
- West – what is process for offering amendments
- Taylor – would like them before Friday but wants to have this on the floor on Friday
- West – asked about Commissioner duties
- Watson – because want to see significant education reform, will be supportive of moving the process along as well
- Watson – thinking this would be later had already started the process of putting together amendments
- Watson – wants to have the process to talk through things on the floor, but will be supportive of moving the process
- Taylor – will have it on Friday, would have preferred to have it in committee but it will be on the floor on Friday
- Watson – know that and why they are doing it
- Hall – will not get in the way of moving it, didn’t even have lege council version until they sat down this morning at the desk, does this bill have no new taxes?
- Taylor – will need additional revenue and there will be an additional bill which is why trying to get this out on Tuesday
- Hall – nothing in this bill forcing us to go to new tax
- Taylor – reality is there needs to be a change, but it would be revenue neutral
- Hall – when will we have the answer to the blanks
- Taylor – hopefully by next Tuesday
- Taylor – know many would rather not vote this out today but it is a process, need to give best effort and will have more time to discuss and can assure them the bill will change as part of the process
- Hall – thinks they can do without creating new taxes to do it, but can support the functional things
- Lucio – appreciates chairman position
- Hall – have a great deal of respect, pride ourselves not being Washington DC and rushed, but understands the position where they are at/its hard to say they are being deliberative and caution about setting precedents
- Taylor – bill is long but it is pretty much the same bill they saw on Thursday and they may have gotten some red line version last night, they were originally hoping to get this out on Tuesday but things have been speed up and revenue issue is still up in the air
- Powell – do appreciate hard work, intend to be part of process to move this forward but approach the process with grave concerns and want to be assured they will have opportunity to work through issues
- Powell – visited with administrators throughout district in SD 10 and very concerned about current year values, outcomes-based performance
- Taylor – points out language allows for alternate assessment from STAAR and working on no one loosing on change
- Paxton – moment in history and its epic, but without runs it is difficult for districts to feel confident of what it means to them, don’t want to obstruct but as much as she wants to get it out of committee, she wants to get it right
- West – in terms of runs, there is a column that says current state aid but know transition funding is in bill, would like to make transition funding embedded in there
- Bettencourt – would like to lay out things and get input, reading things for the first time that is concerning to him, page 295 has blanks
- Bettencourt – a bill of this magnitude would be well served with another week of committee work
- Bettencourt – spoke about maximum compressed tax rate, on page 277-278 “annual inflation rate” language and asked about language
- Taylor – he believes it is an error and the numbers got flipped so they will review it
- Bettencourt – page 289 there were blanks, closes saying he can’t vote for the bill at this point
- Bettencourt – the fact that the entire funding mechanism is unknown at this time and blanks in the bill and errors in the bill cannot vote for the bill
- Taylor – will call for a vote today, will correct as people find things
- Fallon – have a unique generational opportunity, will be voting aye
- Taylor – chokes up stating this has been a grueling process but has been worth it
- Campbell – this is transformational, thinks Taylor has done a herculean effort
- Substitute is adopted on HB 3
- Voted out of Committee with 8 ayes and 3 PNV *Bettencourt, Hall, Paxton