TCTA provides input on TRS pension fund, ActiveCare at House hearing

As the Texas House and Senate prepare for the 2023 session, TCTA is urging lawmakers to address the adverse impact of inflation on current and retired teachers and the teacher shortage in Texas to ensure that compensation, including health insurance premiums for active teachers and retirement benefits, provides teachers with a net wage that reflects their contributions and overall effect on students, the community and economy.

In written testimony about the TRS pension fund and TRS-Active Care submitted during a Sept. 8 hearing of the House Appropriations Committee, TCTA requested that lawmakers balance the responsibility to ensure the TRS pension fund remains actuarially sound with the need to increase pension benefits due to the loss of purchasing power by retirees since 2004 and provide a meaningful cost-of-living adjustment.

Regarding TRS-ActiveCare, TCTA requested that lawmakers consider a more permanent solution to rising health care costs for teachers by considerably increasing the $75 state contribution and indexing it to inflation in future years.

TCTA also recommended that TRS collect certain data from districts based on the change to regional pricing to determine the impact on districts and school employees. Specifically, TRS should determine:

• for each district experiencing a decrease in premiums, whether the district lowers its contribution; and if so, whether the savings went back into employee compensation such as salaries; and
• in future years, for each district that experiences an increase, whether the district makes up the difference in additional costs or passes it through to the employee.