Oppose HB2800, find real solutions to teacher pay

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As longtime teachers who came to the Legislature to better invest in our children and schools, it felt strange to find ourselves voting “no” in committee on House Bill 2800, a bill that markets itself as a way to increase teacher salaries.

Clearly, we absolutely agree that teachers should receive a significant and sustainable raise. That’s exactly what we plan to fight for in a negotiated, bi-partisan state budget.

But HB2800 is a headline without the rest of the story. The devil, as they say, is in the details. And many of the details in HB2800 are troubling.

First, the plan leaves out special education teachers, counselors, instructional specialists, and other vital members of the school team who are in short supply. Without them, we grossly increase the burden on teachers.

Fiscally, this bill only provides one-time funding for the next two years. It does not address where the money will come from for the ongoing increase.

Projections indicate Arizona will not have sufficient ongoing funds to add $700 million annually in one-time spending as this bill specifies. The sponsor does not say what he would cut from the budget to continue this funding.

Frankly, properly investing in our public schools has not been a goal of the GOP – instead, they have prioritized tax cuts for the wealthy, and this year alone are giving away almost $400 million in taxpayer dollars to unaccountable private schools with no transparency.

Since HB2800 prohibits a school from reducing the increased salaries, if the Legislature fails to fulfill its promised line-item funding, are schools on their own to figure out how to pay for that increase? That could mean enormous class sizes or even school shutdowns.

The bill also increases costs for schools as they face increased retirement and Social Security payments that go with those higher salaries, exacerbating the inequities between wealthy districts and those in lower socio-economic areas.

Finally, the funds in this bill are also subject to the school spending limit, which so far has no permanent fix since Republicans continue to ignore Democratic proposals to update it.

This bill is a wolf in sheep’s clothing that threatens instability for our teachers, schools, and all Arizonans who depend on an educated workforce.

The sponsor would have known of these issues if he had worked together with nonpartisan education experts from the Arizona School Boards Association, the Arizona School Administrators, the Arizona Education Association, the Arizona Association of School Business Officials, individual superintendents and others, all of whom have shared serious concerns about HB2800.

But frankly, the Republicans who ran on this bill already have the knowledge and experience to know that this plan won’t work in the long term. It may make a great headline, but our students deserve real solutions, not just shiny promises.

If the sponsor is serious about addressing this long-time issue, we urge him to work together with those of us who have been championing increases in public school salaries and funding that have gone unheard of for over a decade by the Republican majority.

This year, Democrats again worked with education leaders to create HB2779, which would provide funding in the base to allow public schools the local control they deserve to significantly raise salaries for all teachers as well as staff who are also in short supply. But typically, it was not even given a hearing.

For years, Republicans have insisted that money bills like this should be negotiated in the budget. So, let’s do that – commit to working together for long-term raises and investments in our teachers and public schools in the budget.

After all, we finally have a governor who shares Arizonans’ long-standing demands to increase teacher and staff salaries – and funding for public schools.

Our children deserve better than political games and false promises. Please join us in urging our colleagues to vote NO on HB2800, and instead work together for bipartisan solutions with the governor and those of us listening to teachers and other education experts.

Prior to being elected, Rep. Judy Schwiebert was a teacher for 27 years – teaching English at Greenway High School before becoming the teacher librarian at Cactus High School. Rep. Nancy Gutierrez, D-Tucson, is a longtime classroom teacher (English, math, yoga) at the high school and community college level. She is currently on leave from Tucson High School, where she has taught yoga since 2013, but will return to the classroom in August.