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Trustees hear legislative update as staff model worst‑case budget; voucher and teacher‑pay bills could affect McAllen ISD funding
Summary
District staff briefed trustees on multiple pending bills in the Texas Legislature and said the district is modeling budgets on current law until bills are final.
At the March 4 workshop staff provided a legislative update and noted staff are modeling the district budget on current law while tracking multiple bills in the Texas Legislature that could materially alter revenues and requirements for 2025–26.
Major items summarized by staff: Garcia walked trustees through three bills discussed by staff:
- Senate Bill 2 (voucher proposal): described as a voucher program that, if enacted as proposed, would provide an amount the presenter summarized as $10,000 for eligible students and $11,500 for students with disabilities. Staff noted the state fiscal impact (as presented in the staff summary) and that details remain subject to change in conference negotiations.
- Senate Bill 26 (teacher compensation on the Senate side): staff summarized a Senate proposal that would provide targeted compensation increases (for example, $2,500 for teachers with three or more years of experience and larger increases for more senior teachers) and would require districts to implement increases. Staff cautioned that some proposed coverage for less-experienced teachers may require local funding.
- House Bill 2 (school finance bill on the House side): staff summarized multiple components including an increase to the basic allotment, adjustments to special-education funding and a proposal to create a fine-arts allotment. Staff said House Bill 2 would invest several billion dollars to change formulas, but that many provisions and the final numbers will depend on session outcomes.
Why it matters: Garcia emphasized the district is modeling a worst-case scenario based on current law because the budget must be adopted in June and legislative action is uncertain. Staff estimated that without legislative changes the district faces an operating gap from enrollment declines, tax compression and other factors of about $2.4 million in maintenance-and-operations revenue in addition to the health-insurance shortfall and potential salary-increase costs; combining those pressures with the highest salary scenario staff modeled produced an illustrative figure near $12.5 million of pressures to address under current-law assumptions.
Ending: Staff said they will update the board as bills advance and adjust the budget model once legislation is final.
