As the Mississippi Legislature’s regular session enters what lawmakers hope are its final days, legislators on Monday appeared to settle the state’s biggest ticket item: spending $3.4-billion on K-12 education.
Though lawmakers were wrapping up most of their work on a nearly $7.4-billion budget, House Speaker Jason White on Monday evening filed a resolution that would extend the legislative session, at least “on paper,” to April 15. The Senate is expected to agree to the resolution, which would buy lawmakers a little more time to haggle out some measures.
House leaders said they still expect to end their session as early as Thursday, and the extension is a parliamentary move. The eleventh-hour haggling includes trying to agree to bills to fund special projects in members’ districts around the state before the session ends.
White on Monday said lawmakers still hope to end an impasse over changes to the state’s pharmacy benefit manager laws, and might ask the governor to call a special session within or at the end of the current regular one to try to reach an agreement.
The education budget bill, which accounts for nearly half of the state’s general fund spending, earmarks around $108 million for teacher and assistant teacher raises.
While the education budget, including an increase of $121 million over the current fiscal year, has been approved by both chambers, it’s not final yet — the bill has been held on a procedural motion that could invite more debate, though that’s unlikely.
A teacher pay raise was one of the session’s headline issues. The two chambers have debated the issue for months, killed each other’s bills, and then revived their respective proposals. In the end, it appears that the Senate’s original $2,000 raise has won out.
The Senate had recently passed a $6,000 teacher pay raise, spread over three years, but legislative leaders said that after reviewing other agencies’ hefty budget requests, the state could only afford the $2,000 raise this year.
During floor debate, Rep. Robert Johnson III, the House Democratic leader from Natchez, unsuccessfully attempted to stall the passage of the education budget to revive the House’s $5,000 teacher pay raise proposal it passed earlier in the session.
“I would suggest that the gentleman has a wonderful idea, and it was our House position, but we based our final decision on the teacher pay raise based on what we had available and what we could afford to give the teachers,” said Rep. Karl Oliver, a Republican from Winona, who promised, “we’ll come back and look at it another year.”
Lawmakers also earmarked millions for a number of Mississippi Department of Education initiatives, including extending the literacy act that boosted reading rates into higher grades, creating a similar statewide math program and implementing financial literacy courses. Lawmakers’ decisions raise state per-student spending to $7,202, up from $6,961.
The House has until Tuesday to table the motion to reconsider it. Then, the education budget would go to the governor for his consideration.
And while the K-12 education budget bill provides funding for the pay raises, the bill that changes teachers’ salary schedules in state law still awaits approval from both chambers, with a deadline of Wednesday.
Lawmakers on Monday continued to haggle over the last of the 100 or so bills that make up the state budget, and on general bills, many of which they’ve debated for weeks. Some highlights:
Session extended ‘on paper’
Lawmakers have extended the legislative session “on paper” until April 15, but it’s largely a precautionary measure.
The Mississippi Constitution does not allow the Legislature to pass bills that spend money during the last five days of a session. Since the final day of the session is set for Sunday, April 5, the measure would give legislators an extra cushion in case they need more time on revenue and spending bills.
Lawmakers could vote to extend the session on paper but still finish by either the end of the week or Sunday’s scheduled final day.
House Rules Committee Chairman Fred Shanks, a Republican from Brandon, told Mississippi Today that lawmakers should pass all of their revenue and budget bills in time, but House leaders wanted to pass the measure as a backup.
PERS changes adopted, no cash infusion
Lawmakers this session have debated changes to the Public Employees’ Retirement System, an effort to undo some changes they made last year that have drawn criticism.
In an effort to shore up the system’s $26 billion in unfunded liabilities, lawmakers last year made the plan more austere, a hybrid defined contribution plan instead of a defined benefit plan, for people hired after March of this year. Opponents said this will make hiring and retaining state employees, such as teachers and first responders, more difficult.
Lawmakers scuttled a proposal from the Senate to pump $1 billion into PERS over the next decade.
A final agreement approved nearly unanimously by the House and Senate would:
Reduce the service requirement for full retirement for new hires from 35 years to 30. Allow retirees to return to state work after 30 days instead of 90, and make other changes to allow retirees to more easily fill vacant state jobs without jeopardizing their retirement benefits. Base retirement payments on an employees’ highest four years of salary instead of their highest eight years. Allow state employees to pay into “catch-up” plans such as Roth IRAs.Bill requiring protective equipment for prisoners sent to governor
Both chambers on Monday adopted a compromise version of House Bill 1444, a measure authored by Rep. Justis Gibbs, a Democrat from Jackson, that will require the Department of Corrections to provide prisoners with protective equipment when using raw cleaning chemicals.
Gibbs introduced the legislation, which also passed the House last year but died in the Senate, in response to the case of Susan Balfour, a woman who developed terminal breast cancer after she came into contact with raw industrial chemicals during cleaning duty. Balfour died in August.
Balfour had filed a federal lawsuit against three private medical contractors for the prison system, alleging medical neglect.
The companies contracted to provide health care to prisoners at the facility over the course of Balfour’s sentence — Wexford Health Sources, Centurion Health and VitalCore, the current medical provider — delayed or failed to schedule follow-up cancer screenings for Balfour even though they had been recommended by prison physicians, the lawsuit alleged. The suit is ongoing even after Balfour’s death.
House Bill 1444 is one of the only prison health reform measures that survived this session. The Senate blocked most of the proposals to improve health care in Mississippi’s prisons, which were driven in part by findings from an ongoing Mississippi Today investigation.
Rep. Becky Currie, the House Corrections Chairwoman driving the push for reforms, said she will try again next session.
Oil spill settlement money sent to Coast projects
The House and Senate adopted a compromise measure that provides $41 million from the Gulf Coast Restoration Fund to various projects to support economic growth along the Coast. The money comes from the state’s settlement with BP over its 2010 Gulf oil well disaster. The House has until Tuesday to table a motion to reconsider its passage of the bill.
Of the 19 projects that would receive money, nine were recommended by the Mississippi Development Authority or the board’s advisory council, which administers funds and manages the application process. The Legislature appropriated funds to 10 projects that were not recommended, totaling about 45% of this year’s money.
While the Legislature makes final decisions on spending the money, a report from the state auditor’s office published in March raised concerns about giving money to projects that are not recommended by MDA. The report said projects might not “meet MDA standards” or not “have clear performance metrics.”
Historically, most projects the Legislature funds for the program follow the application process but the Auditor’s report found that 34% of projects the legislature has approved did not submit an application. This year, at least one project did not appear to have submitted an application to MDA.This year’s projects include the restoration of the Long Beach Harbor Complex, repairs to a shipbuilding facility and setting up a museum at the Mississippi Songwriters Performing Arts Center.
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