Legislature(2003 - 2004)
05/05/2003 01:35 PM Senate HES
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* first hearing in first committee of referral
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+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
ALASKA STATE LEGISLATURE
SENATE HEALTH, EDUCATION AND SOCIAL SERVICES
STANDING COMMITTEE
May 5, 2003
1:35 p.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator Fred Dyson, Chair
Senator Lyda Green, Vice Chair
Senator Gary Wilken
Senator Gretchen Guess
MEMBERS ABSENT
Senator Bettye Davis
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
SENATE BILL NO. 202
"An Act relating to school transportation; relating to the base
student allocation used in the formula for state funding of
public education; and providing for an effective date."
MOVED SB 202 OUT OF COMMITTEE
SENATE BILL NO. 145
"An Act relating to reemployment of and benefits for retired
teachers or employees, including those who participated in
retirement incentive programs, and to the employment as teachers
of members of the public employees' retirement system who
participated in a retirement incentive program; and providing
for an effective date."
MOVED CSSB 145(STA) OUT OF COMMITTEE
PREVIOUS ACTION
SB 202 - No previous action to consider.
SB 145 - See State Affairs minutes dated 4/29/03.
WITNESS REGISTER
Mr. Eddy Jeans, School Finance Manager
Department of Education &
Early Development
801 W 10 St.
Juneau, AK 99801-1894
POSITION STATEMENT: Supported SB 202.
Ms. Jennie Hammond
PO Box 7100
Nikiski AK 99635
POSITION STATEMENT: Opposed SB 202.
Dr. Bruce Johnson
Association of Alaska School Boards
th
316 W 11 St.
Juneau, AK 99801
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on SB 202 and supported SB 145.
Mr. Tim Steele, Vice President
Anchorage School Board
3580 E Tudor Rd.
Anchorage AK 99507
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on SB 202 and supported SB 145.
Mr. John Alcantra
Government Relations Director
National Education Association of Alaska (NEAA)
114 2nd Street
Juneau AK 99801
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on SB 202.
Mr. Steve Kalmes, Director
Transportation
Anchorage School District
3580 E. Tudor Rd.
Anchorage AK 99507
POSITION STATEMENT: Opposed SB 202.
Mr. Larry Wiget, Executive Director
Public Affairs
Anchorage School District
4600 Debarr Rd.
Anchorage AK 99508
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on SB 202.
Senator Gary Stevens
Alaska State Capitol
Juneau, AK 99801-1182
POSITION STATEMENT: Sponsor of SB 145.
Ms. Janet Parker, Deputy Director,
Division of Retirement and Benefits
Department of Administration
PO Box 110200
Juneau, AK 99811-0200
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on SB 145.
Mr. Kevin Sweeney, Legislative Liaison
Department of Education &
Early Development
th
801 W 10 St.
Juneau, AK 99801-1894
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on SB 145.
ACTION NARRATIVE
TAPE 03-26, SIDE A
SB 202-EDUCATION FUNDING &PUPIL TRANSPORTATION
CHAIR FRED DYSON called the Senate Health, Education and Social
Services Standing Committee meeting to order at 1:35 p.m.
Present were Senators Green, Wilken, Guess and Dyson. The first
order of business to come before the committee was SB 202.
SENATOR GARY WILKEN, sponsor of SB 202, said it has two
provisions relating to the K12 public education funding and they
are both intertwined within the Senate operating budget. The
first item is that SB 202 revises the method in which local
school districts are reimbursed for pupil transportation costs.
Over the past seven years, district transportation costs have
increased 77 percent, from $32.8 million in FY97 to $58.1
million in FY04. This legislation establishes a pupil
transportation grant program as a means to control the growth of
these costs. Under the program, local school districts will
receive an allocation based on their actual per student
transportation cost in FY03. In FY04 and beyond, the pupil
transportation grant will be determined by multiplying the
district's transportation allocation by their student
enrollment. The reimbursement program recognizes fiscal
constraint while continuing to support local school districts
with their transportations costs.
The second part of the bill increases the K12 education funding
per student amount to $4,169, an increase of $159. This change
distributes $32.1 million to 53 school districts through the
education foundation formula, a plan that offers stable and
predictable revenue to all 53 school districts.
SENATOR GRETCHEN GUESS asked who came up with the transportation
formula and how they came up with the $1,200 figure. One of her
concerns was that dispersed districts had more costs because
they have more roads than in the denser districts.
SENATOR WILKEN replied that he wanted Eddy Jeans to explain the
answer, but basically those kinds of routes are embodied in the
current funding to school districts.
MR. EDDY JEANS, School Finance Manager, answered Senator Guess'
question about the $1,200 by saying that it is a policy
statement of the maximum amount they are willing to reimburse a
district on a per student basis. There are five districts that
exceed the $1,200. Alaska Gateway was at $1,464; Bristol Bay was
at $1,322; Copper River was at $1,300; Delta/Greely was at
$1,351; and Southeast Island was at $1,234. They already know
that a boat picks up students at Southeast Island. Some of those
parents will be paid 'in lieu of' (giving parents $.30 per mile)
to run their bus route a little bit further and their costs next
year should come in below what they are on a per student basis
this year.
He said that the Delta Greely school district has a sole source
bid on their contract, but, hopefully, they will be able to
negotiate a better rate. If not, they can possibly do
transportation cheaper in-house.
SENATOR GUESS asked how many districts' pupil transportation
would be over $1,200 in FY04.
MR. JEANS replied that they did not run FY04 figures, because it
is better to base the formula on actual expenses versus
projected expenses. He said that Delta Greely projected a slight
increase in FY04, but more students are projected. Under this
grant program, based on the projected 882 pupils for FY04, they
will actually generate $1 million. That is because growth is
built into the foundation program for projection purposes, but
not into their transportation budget. "So, you're going to have
some winners and losers in this proposal and we know it's not
perfect, but it's better than the current reimbursable system,
we believe."
SENATOR GUESS asked what the fuel cost was in FY03, since it has
gone up so much in the last year. Where is the discussion and
adjustment for fuel cost?
MR. JEANS replied that the majority of questions he has received
on that are related to the new proposed fuel tax and
municipalities are exempt from that. Contractors would have to
pay the increase, however, and there have been questions on
whether a district could reopen their contract to renegotiate a
different rate if the district provided the fuel.
It depends on what kind of negotiating people want to
do. Mr. Chairman, the reason for this is, as Senator
Wilken pointed out, the cost of the pupil
transportation programs have just grown by leaps and
bounds over the last 10 years. In fact, since 1990,
it's increased 136%. Senator Wilken used a little
smaller time frame, so his percentage is a little
lower than mine. We believe at the department that if
we continued with this current reimbursable system
that we're going to have transportation costs that are
going to exceed $100 million by 2012. The pupil
transportation programs are contracted every five
years. We get increases with those and they also have
inflation built into them, an automatic inflationary
adjustment.
SENATOR GUESS responded that she still wanted her question
answered on gas prices. She didn't care about the taxes.
SENATOR WILKEN responded:
I guess if one wanted to consider that you could
renegotiate when fuel costs went up, then we would
also renegotiate a fuel cost down. I'm not sure if
anybody would ever agree on what the price of fuel
would be in 53 different school districts. That may be
something more than we are able to handle. I suspect
it's just like other things. You just deal with it. I
don't think it's a disproportionate share of the
budget that can't be handled in some other way.
CHAIR DYSON said in the school districts he represents the
school bus management is about as good as he knows how to make
it.
When you lock in a cost in this bill, a district like
mine may be doing the most efficient job that good
fleet managers can do, they're at a disadvantage vis-
à-vis a school district that has been real sloppy
about it and could gain a lot in efficiencies. I know
it's impossible to deal with that, but can you tell me
what your guys' thinking was?
MR. JEANS replied:
I've been working very closely with the school
districts for a number of years trying to get some
containment on the pupil transportation program. In
fact, you may remember how we worked with the
Anchorage, Fairbanks, Mat-Su to bring contract
alignments so that we could get outside contractors
into the state. We were successful with bringing some
outside contractors in. Were their rates substantially
lower than the existing contractors? The answer is no.
But, they had to bust into our system. So they had
high start up costs associated with that. In fact, as
you know, Anchorage and Mat-Su enjoy brand new buses.
I've heard people say during some of this testimony,
not in this committee, but in the House side, this
isn't fair, because some districts are at the end of
their contract and they're going to require new buses
and others aren't. Quite frankly, Mr. Chairman and
committee members, I have not seen a contract go down,
because somebody did not have to buy new buses. The
rates seem to go up in justification as we need new
buses, but five years later, after we've paid for the
buses through this program, the rates aren't going
back down. It just continues to build. That's part of
the reason this proposal is before you.
CHAIR DYSON said it has been represented to him that a
disproportionate and most uncontrollable part of the
transportation cost is serving handicapped kids. In his
district, 60 percent of the routes deal with children with
physical disabilities. He asked if there was any solution to
that problem.
MR. JEANS answered that issue had been brought to the
department's attention and they are currently working with the
Anchorage school district to resolve it, but it's already a part
of the equation.
At least the ratio that they're dealing with right now
would be carried on into the future. It would not
address if their special ed population went from 50
percent to 60 percent or 70 percent of their total
population. That would not be addressed in this
proposal....
One of his main concerns is that the formula is based on
verifiable data and the OASIS system verifies every student in
the state and where they go to school. That's why they've tried
to tie the grant program to the average daily membership. It
wouldn't add any new reporting burden to the school district. He
has been asked by some school districts why he won't use
ridership, but that's a self-reported number requiring auditing
of school districts on the number of students riding their buses
every day.
CHAIR DYSON asked if they reimburse special educations routes?
MR. JEANS answered that the special education routes are already
included in the current year's reimbursement and that would be
carried over into the grant system. The special education routes
tend to be more expensive than the regular routes. Fewer
students used them and typically require aides and sometimes
interpreters.
CHAIR DYSON said it was a big issue that he would be glad to
talk to him about at another time.
SENATOR GUESS asked the sponsor what happens if the costs fall
under the grant.
SENATOR WILKEN answered that his school district is embracing
this idea because now they can sit around the table and have a
discussion about people transportation costs knowing if they can
do it more efficiently with less cost, they're able to take
every dollar saved and put it into the classroom. The next
question becomes when the FY 03 allocation for money starts to
become too tight, they would start to have a discussion about
increasing it the FY 06 allocation, for instance. This helps to
focus the discussion.
SENATOR GUESS said there had been a lot of discussion in the
last two years on gifted transportation and she was assuming
they were talking about everyone's transportation.
MR. JEANS replied that was correct; this includes everybody's
current transportation profile.
SENATOR GUESS said she has the same concern that Senator Dyson
does in areas like Anchorage, Fairbanks, Mat-Su and Juneau where
they are constantly having an increase in special education
children, this formula could be a real problem. They are
assuming all the proportions are going to stay the same. She
didn't know if they could separate out routes and costs or not.
MS. JENNIE HAMMOND said she lives in Nikiski with her husband
and two children, ages three and five. She does everything she
can to get her children ready for school. She said legislators
need to step up the funding to get more teachers back in the
classroom. She opposed SB 202 and urged them to increase the
foundation formula.
CHAIR DYSON asked her where she heard about this issue.
MS. HAMMOND replied that she read about it in the paper and
attended school board meetings. The school board did not support
it either.
MR. BRUCE JOHNSON, Association of Alaska School Boards, thanked
the members of the Senate and Senator Wilken, in particular, who
attended their recent fly-in. They have had a lot of opportunity
to interact about this issue. They recognize this as a policy
shift and if it's one they are going to make, he encouraged them
to consider that there will be winners and losers. "It will be
easier to create efficiencies in larger systems than smaller
systems and let's be certain we do not penalize smaller
districts."
He said it would be hard for Tok, for instance, to create any
efficiencies because there is one road, with one driver, who
will pick up the same students. They would be impacted by the
$1,200 cap as well as flat student enrollment at this point,
which is further eroding their issues. He urged them to focus on
intensive students, the ones who are often in need of
transportation to and from school, which is required by federal
law. This is the issue Anchorage and other districts are talking
about. "How to deal with that when it's a federal mandate other
than taking money from someplace else in order to accommodate
that."
He said there was potential for improvement in the bill before
the end of session and there were ways they could mitigate the
negative issues for some of the districts.
Regarding the per pupil increase in the foundation, he
acknowledged the hard work that went into rolling funds
currently outside of the formula into the per pupil allocation
while recognizing that it represents flat funding at a time when
there are significant rising costs in most of the districts.
MR. TIM STEELE, Vice President, Anchorage School Board, thanked
them for rolling Learning Opportunity Grants (LOG) into the
foundation formula. He said:
In a year that saw virtually every candidate for the
legislature as well as the governor express support
for education, it's difficult to be thankful for any
cuts. Funding for any component of our educational
matrix at the '03 level is a cut in the purchasing
power of our schools all across the state. After a
decade of inadequate funding and increased state and
federal mandates, we had hoped at the beginning of the
session that we would make some progress. Senator
Stevens, then in the House, submitted legislation to
increase the formula by $118 per student (4128). This
is a 2.9% increase in the formula over last year's
funding. That would at least keep pace with inflation.
Alaska is not a poor state and our tax burden is the
lowest in the United States. If we can't even keep
pace with the cost of living and educating our
children, what can we say for the future. A failure to
provide even the cost of living increase will
negatively impact the quality of education in our
schools. Please, amend this bill by adding a cost of
living increase of $118 to the formula. This would at
least be some progress, not progress that represents
adequacy, but certainly would be going in the right
direction.
MR. JOHN ALCANTRA, Government Relations Director, National
Education Association Alaska, said they believe that the work
the Senate Finance Committee has done so far is heading Alaska
in the right direction.
An important component of the committee's work was in
putting the money into the base student allocation.
This allows districts some stability of funding and
helps them meet some of the requirements of state
standards. NEA-Alaska has advocated for a base student
allocation of $42.80 per student since May of last
year. Forty-two eighty is a conservative estimate,
asking for just one year of inflationary costs and
just one year of unmet needs identified by business
leaders such as Roger Conn, Jim Palmer and Carl Mars
in a report published two years ago. These leaders
asked for a base student allocation increase of about
$365 per pupil over five years, plus increases to deal
with the erosion caused by inflation. We collectively
realize the budgetary situation in Alaska; we just
only request one year instead of trying to fill the
hole all at once. Our suggestion, which again, has
been on the table for over 10 months, will cost the
state approximately $31 million in FY 04, but it goes
to the constitutional mandate of a quality public
education. The sponsors of a companion piece in the
House, HB 233, which increase the base student
allocation by $158 per pupil has also identified $14
million in lapsed funds to [indisc] to a new LOG
program in the capital budget. This amounts to an
additional $70 per pupil. This idea gets us another
step closer to the goal of adequately funding K12
education for FY 04. The budget for last year was
based on $20.50 per barrel of oil and the CBR draw at
about $950 million. With oil averaging over $28 per
barrel for the first 10 months of this fiscal year,
this means the CBR draw will be about $400 to $450
million less than anticipated. K12 funding needs just
$31 million to adequately fund K12 for the next fiscal
year beginning July 1....
NEA-ALASKA believes the education community should
take the remainder of the school year to identify
pupil needs under the state standard and the No Child
Left Behind (NCLB) Law. This would be the basis for a
long-term fix for education funding...
He said his own personal research shows that this bill would add
only about $2 million in funding for K12 education in FY 04 and
with the additional requirement of the (NCLB) law and the almost
2 percent inflation of 2002, this additional funding, while in
the proper category of the base student allocation, falls short
of the need for the next year.
MR. STEVE KALMES, Director, Transportation, Anchorage School
District, reminded the committee that school bus transportation
is the safest form of transportation in America today. One of
the premises of the bill is that all student transportation
operations are inefficient, but there isn't any money he can
pull off transportation and put in the classroom in Anchorage.
It would be just the opposite. He said there is incentive to
save as he has worked for five superintendents in Anchorage who
were all interested in being as efficient as possible. There are
also interested people in the community and budget review teams
have gone over their budgets. Two hundred and forty-seven buses
are being run in Anchorage currently and in 1984, they ran 291.
This is with a larger student enrollment. About 37% of the buses
that run in the Anchorage school district transport 5 percent of
their population, the special education students. About 45
percent of their costs are allocated to those students. This
includes preschoolers and any student who attends any program
that isn't available in the home school, as well. Reductions in
transportation costs will impact the regular routes since they
can't cut special education routes.
Upcoming issues are current contracts that are in place until
2006 that have increased costs in them for the next several
years. There are increased costs for labor and fuel and high
driver turnover. He said that a long-term equitable solution
needed to be found by the legislature.
SENATOR WILKEN noted:
More importantly, today there is nothing in the system
that encourages or forces a district to see how to do
it better. That's the important part about this grant
system and I believe that's why the administration is
supporting such a system and it puts that decision on
the local people where it should be. The funding for
it, then, is the responsibility of the legislature to
weigh those requests for resources just as we weigh
others.
MR. LARRY WIGET, Executive Director, Public Affairs, Anchorage
School District, said he wanted to read something into the
record from the spring 2002 education report for the Alaska
State Senate Finance Committee.
To educate Alaska's children, they must first get
safely to school. Consistent, safe and efficient
transportation is vital to the education process.
Pupil transportation is not cheap, but is essential.
Money for transporting students frees up funds for the
classroom. If the state did not fully fund these
costs, districts would be forced to use classroom
dollars to pay for getting students safely to school.
This is a policy shift, which will negatively impact
the Anchorage school district.
CHAIR DYSON said that the committee had requested fiscal notes
from DEED, but had not yet received them.
MR. JEANS responded that DEED submitted those fiscal notes to
the legislative liaison office on Friday and he didn't know why
they didn't have them.
SENATOR GUESS asked if any districts were going to lose money
from where their LOGS are now with net increases in the base
student allocation.
SENATOR WILKEN responded that no one should lose any dollars.
MR. JEANS added that when they look at this in terms of moving
the LOGS inside the foundation formula, the district that would
be most adversely affected by that would be the Anchorage school
district. This bill has enough of an increase so they would more
than recover what they would lose by moving their LOG grants
into the foundation formula. He couldn't tell her on an
individual basis.
SENATOR GUESS said she knows the number of intensive students is
tracked as part of the foundation formula and asked if the
number of special education students who need transportation is
a verifiable piece of data.
MR. JEANS replied that they have their federal count that was
done on December 1, but it wasn't verifiable data. The intensive
count is the next level he would go to and he needs some costs
from a couple of school districts so he can break it down. They
have been trying to run that data.
SENATOR WILKEN brought forth a fiscal note from Representative
Gatto's bill on this subject and he asked the committee to look
at it and move this bill on to Finance where it would get a
fiscal note that he didn't think would be any different than the
one before them.
SENATOR GREEN moved to pass SB 202 from committee with
individual recommendations with the anticipated fiscal notes.
There were no objections and it was so ordered.
SB 145-REEMPLOYMENT OF RETIRED TEACHERS
CHAIR FRED DYSON announced SB 145 to be up for consideration.
SENATOR GARY STEVENS, sponsor, said Alaska is facing a shortage
of qualified teachers and this bill would allow the rehiring of
early retired teachers. The Retirement Incentive Program (RIP)
was a big disincentive for people to return to work, as they
would have to pay back 110 percent of the benefits they
received. There is no actuarial impact to the districts, but
they would be required to certify that they are experiencing a
shortage. This would not guarantee tenure and salaries would be
negotiable. It does not require districts to hire RIP teachers,
but gives them that option in times of need. It will not cost
the state money because it has already been taken care of
through the retirement system and it will help the shortage of
teachers in our state.
TAPE 03-26, SIDE B
SENATOR GARY WILKEN asked how he envisioned certification being
done.
SENATOR STEVENS replied certification would be a notification to
the Department of Education that a district is experiencing a
shortage of teachers. Otherwise, he didn't know any of the
specifics of the procedure.
SENATOR WILKEN asked if certification adds to the bureaucracy
and what does it do to help in the scheme of things. Does anyone
look at the certification or does it put someone on notice?
SENATOR STEVENS replied that he thought it would just require
the district to look at it carefully to make sure they weren't
using it because they had a RIP teacher available, and that
there was, in fact, a shortage. He would be more comfortable
having the department comment on the specifics.
SENATOR WILKEN asked if he envisioned that the teachers coming
back would be included or excluded from the NEA bargaining unit.
SENATOR STEVENS answered that they would not be receiving
retirement or benefits from the union because the district
negotiates the contract and is separate from the union. He
thought they would be outside the purview of the union.
CHAIR DYSON wanted clarification on page 3, section 4, on
receiving benefits during the period of reemployment. An earlier
page indicates they may within 30 days of reemployment elect to
continue receiving benefits during the period by filing a waiver
of coverage.
MS. JANET PARKER, Division of Retirement and Benefits, explained
that when coming back to work the employee has the option to
continue receiving their benefits or to waive their retirement
benefit and continue to receive retirement credit.
But if they want, and it's certainly to their
advantage if you're eligible to retire with a full
retirement benefit of 20 years or longer, then you can
actually work and receive both your paycheck and your
retirement check.
She said that dozens of retirees had been brought back that way.
CHAIR DYSON said this is just giving RIP'd employees the same
options as existing retired employees have.
MS. PARKER said that was correct.
CHAIR DYSON asked if a retired teacher is hired back at any
level their new employer chooses.
SENATOR STEVENS answered that he thought that was negotiable.
MS. PARKER said she thought someone from the school board could
best answer that question. She didn't know about the different
contracts. It's possible that they could collectively bargain to
reduce their salary off the normal salary schedule they have.
CHAIR DYSON said he was confused and asked again if there was
any language in the bill that would require the district to hire
someone in at the level they were when they retired or can they
hire someone back at any level that is mutually acceptable to
them.
SENATOR STEVENS replied that he thought the later was the case.
The district is not forced to hire anyone back at the level they
retired from.
CHAIR DYSON said he may have asked the question poorly and asked
again:
If they came back and chose not to get their
retirement benefits while they were working, I read
the bill to say that they would accumulate additional
retirement benefits to be collected at a future date
after they retired a second time.
MS. PARKER said that is correct.
CHAIR DYSON asked further if they chose the later course, are
they accruing their additional retirement benefits based upon
their new salary in the new job that they have negotiated or is
it at the level it was when they retired the first time.
MS. PARKER replied they would receive a benefit based upon their
new segment of employment, however long and at that salary.
SENATOR STEVENS said the bill had two things that could happen.
One, you can be a RIP teacher and decide to go back into
teaching and pay back 110 percent of everything you have
received - back into the system as you were before retiring.
"All sins are forgiven" - and you're a tenured teacher at
whatever level you were. The second choice is you can say you
are going to keep your retirement.
CHAIR DYSON interrupted saying there is a difference between
keeping your retirement and keeping RIP benefits. "Those are two
different things."
MS. PARKER said that he was correct about that. "If I decide to
come back and I was a RIP retiree and if I don't accept the
waiver, then I have to pay the penalties - for teachers it's 110
percent of the benefits received, which would be pretty..."
CHAIR DYSON asked what happened if you do accept the waiver.
MS. PARKER replied if you accept the waiver, you forego the
penalty, you don't have to pay anything back. You continue to
get your benefit and whatever salary agreement you have made
with the school district.
CHAIR DYSON asked, "So, somebody that got a RIP and comes back
under the waiver that would be authorized under this bill cannot
accumulate any more retirement benefits?"
MS. PARKER said that was correct.
SENATOR STEVENS agreed with that.
CHAIR DYSON asked where in the bill it made that clear.
SENATOR WILKEN asked why someone would choose not to continue to
receive his benefits.
SENATOR STEVENS responded that he thought it was unlikely that
anyone would choose to pay back 110 percent. He thought they are
really dealing with the other scenario of someone who chooses to
keep their retirement and receive some pay for the work they do.
SENATOR WILKEN speculated if he is getting his retirement pay,
he might come back at half of what he made before.
SENATOR GREEN said there is a provision currently in statute
that allows, if you establish a special circumstance in your
area and you have to have someone on staff, you can get a waiver
from PERS or TRS and go through a process that is somewhat
similar to this.
MS. PARKER explained that is the section of law that they are
amending with SB 145. Before, it applied only to the normal
retiree.
SENATOR GREEN said she was concerned that the block of money
that was paid back went into the system, not back to the
district.
SENATOR WILKEN asked if this was a slippery slope they were
starting down and what other groups would be asking to do this
in the future if teachers get it today.
SENATOR STEVENS said they already started on that slippery slope
when they approved the commissioner to do this.
SENATOR WILKEN asked if the state grader operators were in a
different system.
MS. PARKER replied that this law only applies to the TRS. There
is a provision similar to this in the PERS and if you are a RIP
retiree, you cannot come back without paying the penalties.
MR. KEVIN SWEENEY, Legislative Liaison, Department of Education
and Early Development (DEED), said he might be able to shed some
light on their questions. The way to certify teacher shortages
is under current statute, which allows someone who didn't take
the RIP to return. It's the same process. The board has to adopt
a policy that shows there is a shortage. They report to the
administrator of their retirement system. Adding the RIP'd
teachers wouldn't affect the department at all.
Regarding the two choices when a teacher comes back, they are
only talking about choice number two with this bill, because
choice number one is already available to them - that is coming
back, paying back the RIP and continuing to get their benefits.
This bill gives them choice two, which is to come back and not
pay back the RIP, not get any new benefits and continue to get
the retirement benefits.
MR. SWEENEY explained for background information that in 2001
when the original bill was passed allowing school districts and
REAAs to hire non-RIP'd teachers, because of an oversight, the
DEED was left out, despite the fact that they operate a couple
of schools in the state and have the teaching learning support
division. For the most part those are certified employees who
require certification.
The division has had a serious problem with turnover
and shortages. The turnover averages 45-55 percent.
Some positions have gone unfilled for years at a time.
This bill also clarifies that the department is able
to use the hire of non-RIP'd teachers in addition to
letting them take advantage of the new RIP'd policy,
if that is what the Legislature decides.
MR. TIM STEELE, Vice President, Anchorage School Board, said he
supported this legislation saying in Anchorage, they are having
a tough time in finding teachers for certain specialties. Alaska
does not prepare enough teachers to hire within the state. The
(NCLB) standard requires highly qualified instructors for all
courses. He said that Anchorage teachers did not participate in
the state RIP program and he didn't anticipate that they would
use this program very much, but it is one more option for
recruiting.
SENATOR WILKEN asked if it was correct that people hired back
under SB 145 would not be represented by a bargaining unit.
MR. STEELE replied that is his understanding.
SENATOR WILKEN asked if he would not expect negotiations that
take place between him and the bargaining unit to include a
class of people called RIP'd rehires.
MR. STEELE replied that he would not and said again that their
numbers would be very small.
MR. BRUCE JOHNSON, Association of Alaska School Boards, said
they supported CSSB 145, although it's not a full answer to the
teacher shortage issue. He informed the committee that
recruitment that is currently going on outside the state is very
expensive. Recently, a several state study suggested that it
costs about 20% of whomever you hire for recruitment costs. He
also submitted that it's another way of keeping people in our
state and contributing to the economy who otherwise might leave,
because they are fairly youthful and want to continue in their
pursuit of teaching elsewhere. "Why not keep that talent and
that service here in Alaska?"
SENATOR LYDA GREEN commented:
I'm sorry Bruce, I didn't want to say this, but why
wouldn't we expect people who teach to work like the
rest of people who have a lifespan of work that goes
far beyond the age of 43? I think it's a bizarre
circumstance. We can take the blame for it; we can
take the credit for it. I think it's a strange system
that anyone is encouraged to retire.
MR. JOHNSON said that debate would probably occur. He is 55 and
still working. He wished he was one of those 43 year olds and
not working, but he's not. He said that most people are working
far beyond their mid-40s; it's just if they participated in a
RIP, which was an opportunity for them, have chosen to leave our
state and are providing service elsewhere.
Let's keep more of those people here who may have
rested for two or three years and done some other
things and decided teaching is really their calling
more long-term than they originally thought.
SENATOR WILKEN asked Senator Gary Stevens if he would object to
a five-year sunset.
SENATOR GARY STEVENS replied that a 2005 sunset was already in
there on page 4, line 28.
SENATOR WILKEN moved to pass CSSB 145(STA) from committee with
individual recommendations and zero fiscal note. There were no
objections and it was so ordered.
CHAIR DYSON adjourned the meeting at 3:04 p.m.
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