House, Senate feuding over property tax relief

While the House and Senate are feuding over property tax legislation this week, education remains on the back burner. The special session that Gov. Greg Abbott called only hours after the regular session ended is limited to the topics of property tax reduction and border security measures.

Under normal circumstances, once the House and Senate have agreed on the relevant legislation, the governor can open up the agenda to other specified topics. But this week, the House passed its versions of the necessary bills and adjourned “sine die” — final adjournment — leaving it up to the Senate to either accept the House proposal or also adjourn and presumably force another special session. The Senate next meets Friday, June 2.

When calling the special session, Abbott noted that it was the “first” special session, surprising no one with the implication that there will be multiple special sessions. Of most interest to the education community are vouchers, school funding, and pay raises. We do not yet know when a special session addressing education issues would be held or what specific topics will be on the agenda.

TCTA is working on analyzing and summarizing the education bills that passed during the regular session, and we plan to include those summaries in next week’s eUpdate. We will continue updating our website with any pertinent news about Capitol goings-on.