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Last Chance to Influence the State BudgetNow is the time for KEA members to contact legislators to ask them to improve the state budget, which includes major cuts to public schools and school employee health care. |
| Status Earlier this week, the Senate passed its version of the state budget. Since it was much different from the House version of the budget, the budget has now gone to a conference committee made up of leaders of each chamber. KEA expects the conference committee to report by early next week. After the committee reports, each chamber will vote on the conference committee report. If both chambers adopt the report, the General Assembly’s version of the budget will go to the Governor, who can sign it, veto the whole budget, or veto part of the budget. The Governor can take things out of the budget but cannot add to it. Both chambers will finally have the opportunity to override any gubernatorial veto. |
| Senate Budget The Senate budget contains cuts in school funding that are almost double those in the House budget -- $111 million as opposed to the House budget’s $56 million in cuts. Neither budget is acceptable. Both will set back Kentucky and its future. If the Commonwealth is ever going to catch up economically, it will be because of our education system. While the Senate budget restores the two instructional days the House cut, the Senate does not fund those days. In addition, the Senate budget removes class size limits and removes the mandate for kindergarten teaching assistants. In addition, the Senate budget removes the requirement that preschool teachers be certified. The Senate cuts almost every aspect of P-12 education including SEEK, FRYSCs, preschool, technology, gifted and talented education, and professional development. |
| Health Insurance Both the House and Senate budgets include no increase in school and state employee and retiree health insurance in 2011 and only a 2% increase in 2012. With medical inflation expected to be about 10% annually, this underfunding is terrible news for school employees. If this level of funding is included in the final budget, the only options for the state insurance plan are either for employees to pay much higher premiums or for the benefits to decline significantly, which will also mean that employees pay much more for medical services. |
| Message to Legislators KEA urges all members to contact both their state representative and state senator. The message is simple: Do not cut education funding. Provide enough funding for health insurance to continue to provide reasonable benefits at a reasonable cost. Contacting legislators is easy. You can call them at 800.372.7181 or email them through the KEA legislative website: www.keepkentuckylearning.org. Time is short so act today and enlist all other KEA members and family members to make the same contacts. |
Progress on Three-Part Fix for KTRS Retiree Health InsuranceFor a decade the state has borrowed from KTRS’ pension fund to pay for health insurance for KTRS retirees. Fixing this situation so further borrowing is not necessary and so the debt is repaid to KTRS is complex. Passage of three bills is necessary: HB 540 has passed the House and the Senate Appropriations and Revenue Committee. As of Thursday night, it was posted for passage in the full Senate. This bill would assure that the KTRS medical fund has enough money to provide for retirees’ health insurance in the future. This plan was negotiated by KTRS, KEA, KEA-Retired and other groups. Active teachers, retirees younger than 65, and school districts would all pay into the fund, with those contributions gradually increasing over the next six years. HB 531 would allow the state to bond the funding for KTRS retiree health care in the next two years while the medical fund builds up enough money to begin paying for health care for current retirees. HB 531 has passed the House and is in Senate A&R, awaiting action. HB 290, the state budget, contains bonding to pay back KTRS the money borrowed from it over the last decade. Bonding is a win-win situation. Because the state can bond (borrow) funds today at a lower interest rate than it borrowed from KTRS, the state saves money on its interest rate. Because all the money borrowed from KTRS would be immediately repaid, KTRS can rebuild its pension fund and begin investing those funds. Message to Senators KEA urges all its members to contact their state senator. The message: Vote for HB 540, HB 531 and the budget provisions to bond the debt to KTRS. Contact senators through the legislative message line (800.372.7181) or KEA’s legislative message line: www.keepkentuckylearning.org. |
Legislative CalendarIn even-numbered years like this, the General Assembly meets for 60 legislative days and must conclude its session by April 15. Friday (3/26) is the 56th day. The General Assembly is expected to meet next Monday and Tuesday. Then it will take a ten-day recess during which the Governor can veto bills. The General Assembly will then come back on April 12 and 13 to consider overriding any vetoes. In the final days of the session, many bills go to conference committees to reconcile the differences in bills as they passed the House and Senate. Once a bill is in conference, almost anything can happen to the bill. Conference committees meet in private so it’s not always able to know what’s going on until the committee reports. All this means that it’s a very dangerous time when bad bills get new life. Watch for Action Alerts from KEA and visit the LRC web site (see below) to keep up by the minute. Bottom line: Time is short to tell your legislator what you think about bills being considered. |
Finding Out about the General Assembly is EasyKEA tracks all education bills every day. You can find a daily bill status update on www.keepkentuckylearning.org. Click “Bill Status Report” in the left column. For even more information about bills and to read the summary and text of all bills, visit the Legislative Research Commission’s web site: www.lrc.ky.gov. The LRC’s web site contains a wealth of information as does KEA’s Keep Kentucky Learning web site. |
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