With the defeat of Amendment 2 at the ballot box, the question now becomes – what will become of teacher pay? The amendment would have converted stipends of $2,000 dollars for teachers and $1,000 dollars for support staff into permanent pay increases. It will take $200 million dollars to keep salaries at their current level. House Appropriations Chairman Jack McFarland says the big challenge for lawmakers is finding that money amid a budget shortfall.
“We have to go back to what we’re looking at as a teachers’ stipend and then, as a teachers’ stipend, we have to figure out where in the budget the money can come from,” McFarland said.
McFarland says the legislature will take another stab at giving teachers and other school staff permanent pay raises, but it will likely not be in the form of a bill as ambitious as Amendment 2.
“It was not in the executive budget that was presented to the legislature. The governor’s budget had already addressed a $194 million dollar shortfall,” McFarland said.
McFarland says whatever the legislature decides to do, they have to do a better job in getting the message out to the public and fight misinformation.
“It’s really difficult to educate the public on an amendment that was that complex, so I do think that if maybe we reevaluate it, put the proposals in different amendments, that there does have a better opportunity to pass,” McFarland explained.
“It gets very difficult to go all over the state and take out that misinformation. It takes a lot of effort, and maybe we need to begin sooner explaining what the amendments do and how they work,” McFarland said.
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