As the Oklahoma teachers' walk-out is looming large, and is looking more probable as each day passes - corporate legislators are starting to sweat, and are scrambling to mislead the public into believing they are providing teacher pay raise bills. Senator Stephanie Bice tried to convince other lawmakers to vote for a school consolidation bill (SB 920) which would have consolidated all schools with 200 students or less (approximately 95). She tried to convince Oklahomans that her bill would put $millions back in the classroom and provide teachers a desperately needed pay raise. The lawmakers that Bice was trying to fool saw through the canard, and voted to sink it - eleven No votes, to only one Yes vote. The bill turned out to be just a distraction in providing teachers a pay raise, and would not have put one thin dime toward teachers salaries.
But Senator Bice, and now Senator Jason Smalley, have announced another bill to provide a teacher pay raise (Senate Joint Resolution 70). SJR 70, authored by Bice, but with avowed corporate charter school cheerleader Smalley telling anyone within earshot how much he knows about school funding - would (according to public school experts Smalley and Bice) allow schools to divert building funds (school ad valorem revenue) to teacher salaries. Bice wants this bill passed in a hurry, so a teacher walk-out is derailed on April 2. Teachers are smarter than what Bice and Smalley credit them, however, so they are unlikely to take the bait.
A closer look at the details of the bill reveals that SJR 70 is only a canard (private school term meaning "false narrative"), just as SB 920 was. The 5-mil building fund for any public school is the local property tax (ad valorem) revenue which can only be utilized by schools for building maintenance and upkeep, and even to build new schools. For example, a typical medium sized school with 2000 students receives 5 mils of net assessed valuation for property tax in its district. If the net assessed value of property within the district is $50,000,000, x .05 = $250,000 the school will receive to operate and maintain its buildings. The school may pay its utilities (gas and electric), pay for building repairs, and pay custodial/maintenance salaries from the $250,000 building fund. No building fund revenue is ever available to pay teacher salaries. If the school were to provide each teacher a $5000 annual salary increase from its building fund, the total raise would amount to approx. $500,000 (double its entire building fund). The school would not even be able to provide a $500 pay increase to teachers from the building fund. So, Bice and Smalley are hoping this canard of a bill will convince teachers to not walk-out.
Another medium sized school with 2000 students, but having almost double the net assessed value, would receive $500,000 in building fund revenue, so could hypothetically provide building fund revenue for teacher pay raises. If School B could provide more $ for teacher pay raises than School A, the inequity in teacher salaries from one school to the next would prove disastrous. Maybe this scenario is what corporate lawmakers want - schools will turn on each other as some schools can pay teachers much more than others. Think about it...
Since SJR 70 went up in smoke - several more teacher pay raise canards (had to look it up in the dictionary) have been trolled by corporate lawmakers, just to see if any teachers would take the bait. But teachers know that any proposed $20,000, $10,000, $5,000, or even $2,500 annual pay raise must have a dedicated revenue source. This means that any teacher salary increase cannot depend on one-time money, or it's a "bonus"... and a canard increase (House Bill 3440). Several teacher pay increase bills such as SB 133 depended on revenue already turned down by the House earlier, so was torpedoed. The Speaker of The House, Charley (Dapper Dan) McCall, introduced a teacher pay raise bill with no number attached, and with no dedicated revenue, so also bit the dirt. So far, all corporate lawmakers have been able to come up with are false narratives for teacher pay increases. We'll continue to monitor the state budget fiasco - to find out if the many corporate lawmakers can solve this problem...
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