Meanwhile, the topic of school-choice vouchers continues to be one of Abbott’s top priorities for lawmakers to pass this session.
SAN ANTONIO — Increasing teacher pay and cutting property taxes were among Gov. Greg Abbott’s top priorities outlined during his State of the State address on Sunday.
Abbott vowed to boost teacher pay, stressing top Texas educators deserve to earn six-figure salaries. Currently, Texas lags behind $9,000 behind the national average in terms of teacher pay. He’s directed lawmakers to pass legislation that would make this happen.
Abbott is also pushing the passage of educational savings accounts, or school-choice vouchers, which would provide eligible families the opportunity to ensure their children can take part in private school.
“Educators are in dire need of a pay increase right now,” said Melina Espiritu-Azocar, president of the Northside AFT, the union representing educators and staff at Northside ISD. “The fact that it’s on the emergency list is important but again the governor could have done something a lot time ago.”
While welcoming of the prospect of increased teacher pay, Espiritu-Azocar knows the big battle over Abbott’s school-choice vouchers will continue and could affect whether teacher raises becomes a reality this legislative session. She also noted there’s a need to boost financial support for non-educators as well.
“We need to see a massive pay increase for our support staff, a living wage for folks who are doing some of the hardest work in our school districts,” Espiritu-Azocar said.
“68% of educators say that they’ve considered leaving the profession over the last year and out of those 52% say they would consider staying if pay was increased,” Espiritu-Azocar said, citing a survey performed by the Texas AFT.
Barry Perez, Northside ISD’s assistant superintendent for marketing and communications, emailed this statement in response to Abbott’s emergency item dealing with teacher pay:
Northside ISD supports any initiative by state legislators to fund and sustain salary increases for Texas educators. An increase in teacher salary not only honors the hard work and dedication of these individuals but also helps districts in addressing the national issues of recruitment and retention of high-quality educators. NISD will continue to advocate for funding public schools and providing their employees wages that support basic living expenses and benefits that reflect current day economic pressures.
NISD is proud to offer competitive salary and healthcare benefits to our employees with the starting salary for educators in 2024-2025 being $60,320.
Abbott is also vouching for further cuts in property taxes. During last session, the legislature tapped into more than $13 billion of a budget surplus that provided some relief for homeowners. UTSA political science professor Jon Taylor believes it’s likely more relief is on the horizon with both legislative chambers being controlled by Republicans.
“Abbott wants to basically try to fight loopholes that Harris County among others have been using to offset tax relief. He wants to basically use $10 billion or so of the budget, of the surplus to pay down even further property taxes, in particular school property taxes,” Taylor said. “You’ll see a little bit of a reduction in your tax bill again. I’m not sure how much. If it gets through the legislature I think it will. It’s pretty popular among Republicans. They just need to hammer out a plan.”