CISD staff gets raise
Educators at the Conroe Independent School District can expect to see a pay bump in the 2016-17 school year. The CISD board approved $11.7 million in pay raises and stipends for its employees during its June 21 meeting.
Educators at the Conroe Independent School District can expect to see a pay bump in the 2016-17 school year.
The CISD board approved $11.7 million in pay raises and stipends for its employees, including teachers, administrators, police, and more, during its June 21 meeting. The pay raises are effective for the 2016-17 school year. The changes were recommended by the Texas Association of School Boards in an effort to bring CISD’s compensation up to par with similar school districts.
“No. 1 it’s retention of your current employees, and it’s being able to recruit the highest qualified teachers that we can, so we need to be very competitive with the Kleins, the Katys and the Cy-Fairs and the Springs (school districts) right in our area,” said Darrin Rice, chief financial officer at CISD, about the increase of teacher salaries.
Most of the pay raises, about $7.5 million, were allocated specifically for teachers, librarians and nurses. The base salary for new, inexperienced teachers, librarians and nurses was raised to $51,500 from $50,000. All current educators received a 3 percent general pay increase, and those with six or more years of experience received anywhere from $100 to about $1,300 in additional pay scale adjustments.
After the adjustments are calculated, CISD’s compensation notched up from 98 percent to 101 percent of the market median, meaning that CISD is paying slightly more than the midpoint of other comparable districts, according to a report of TASB’s recommendations to CISD.
“We rely a lot on the TASB compensation group,” Rice said. “We take that recommendation, we look at it, and then we make our calls to other districts to see what they’re doing and how we compare just to double-check that.”
The salary increase comes after trustees approved raising employee contributions to health insurance in April, meaning for some, the salary raise may not put them ahead.
The district had a $6.15 million funding gap for its health insurance, so $5.5 million in increased employee contributions and changes to co-pays, deductibles, and prescription costs was used to shrink that divide. CISD kicked in additional funding to cover the leftover deficit.
CISD trustee Melanie Bush, who voted to approve increased contributions to close the gap, was still concerned about employees who may actually see a pay cut in spite of the modest raises. She also noted the disjointed approval process for budget items.
“There was a disconnect personally for me with what we approved with health increases. Some of our raises don’t cover all of the health increase, and so some of our staff are actually going to be getting somewhat of a pay cut due to the health insurance increase. I agree with what we did, I’m not questioning what we did, but personally, I would like it if we get all the information at once and are approving all at the same time rather than pay increase this month and health insurance in previous months,” Bush said.
CISD employees with a spouse or children on the CISD plan may experience a net pay cut, not employees on the individual plan. The monthly premium on the individual plan amounts to an extra $300 a year, while the employee and children plan amounts to a $1,272 annual increase in premiums, the hardest hit plan. Raises for teachers covers their shortfall, but CISD staff on the lower end of the pay scale may feel a hit to their pocketbooks.
“Anytime that there is an increase in the health insurance that was not covered by teachers’ raises this year, it was not for the employee’s health insurance. It was for the dependents. They did not have an employee increase that would not be covered by this raise,” said John Husbands, CISD board president.
“It’s only one subset, and it’s a very small group,” Bush said
In addition to increased salaries, $343,000 was set aside for stipends. Certified bilingual teachers in Spanish will receive $4,000 a year, a $1,000 increase over previous years. The school district also added four new $1,000 stipends for special education teachers for autism intervention and management, life skills, pre-school program for children with disabilities and social development.
The increased salaries and stipends are part of CISD’s 2016-17 projected district budget of $439.3 million. The school board will approve the coming school year’s budget during its July board meeting.
CISD expects a net drop of $21 million in state revenue for the 2016-17 year due to the state’s “Robin Hood” tax recapture program that funnels money from property wealthy districts to less advantaged districts in the state. CISD expects the increased tax- revenue projections from rising property appraisal values will close the shortfall.