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Committee advances teacher benefit bill setting 30-day maternity baseline, tightening sick-day and annual-leave rules
Summary
Senate Bill 9, as amended by a committee substitute, would set a baseline of up to 30 days of maternity leave for teachers, standardize rollover rules for sick days toward retirement, prohibit counting annual leave toward retirement in certain cases, and require district reporting. The committee recommended the bill favorably, 15-0.
The House State Government Committee recommended Senate Bill 9 favorably after sponsor Senator Jimmy Higdon described changes to teacher retirement and leave policies, including a new baseline for maternity leave.
Senator Higdon told the committee the bill "allows maternity leave, up to 30 days" and creates a statewide minimum that school districts may exceed by local action. The bill also permits districts to roll over up to 13 sick days to be counted toward retirement, and it requires districts to report the number of sick days, annual leave days and their sick-day policies.
Higdon said the bill would stop a practice in which some administrators convert unused annual leave into sick days for retirement calculations; the bill would prohibit that practice and add reporting requirements. The measure also adds the virtual Computer Science Career Academy to the approved list of state agencies and includes cleanup language for the Teachers' Retirement System (TRS). The bill includes a voluntary incentive allowing school districts to offer a bonus of up to $1,000 a year for five years to certain new hires in Tier 4.
Representative Donworth asked whether the baseline maternity leave could be extended to adoption or foster placements; the sponsor said districts could choose to provide broader leave but the bill sets a minimum of 30 days and does not itself extend that minimum to adoption or foster care. Representative Tipton and others asked about the actuarial cost of allowing greater rollover or larger sick-day banks; the committee record includes a figure cited in committee discussion that the current unfunded liability related to these sick-day accruals was "about $800,000,000." The sponsor said a district that opts to provide more than the baseline would pay the actuarial cost for the additional days and the pension system would bill that cost to the district.
The committee adopted the committee substitute and recommended the bill favorably to the House by a recorded vote of 15 yes, 0 no. Committee members asked several questions during discussion; the committee did not amend the bill on the floor of the committee.
Action summary: Senate Bill 9 (teacher benefits and TRS-related changes) — committee recommendation: favorable; committee vote: 15 yes, 0 no. The bill sets statewide baselines, imposes reporting requirements, and assigns actuarial responsibility to districts that maintain benefit levels above the statutory baseline.
