House Committee Moves Forward on Teacher Retention Bill

mcdanielBy Jason Doyle Oden
The McCarville Report

A plan to help reduce the impact of the national teacher shortage on Oklahoma is taking a step forward. The House Business, Labor and Retirement Laws Committee Wednesday voted to send House Bill 1061 to the state actuary for review. The measure is authored by Rep. Randy McDaniel and will allow school district to pay up to $18,000 a year for the first 36 months after they begin collecting their retirement benefits.

“I am pleased that the members of the committee were willing to discuss this idea and debate its merits,” said McDaniel who is the chairman of the committee. “All but one other state is currently dealing with a teacher shortage which is exacerbated by the retirement of many of our best and most experienced educators.”

The move increases the current annual salary cap by $3,000 a year. The plan is to incentivize recently retired teachers to return to Oklahoma classrooms.

“We have reduced unfunded liabilities in OTRS (Oklahoma Teachers Retirement System) by more than $6 billion during the past six years, and we continue to prove our commitment to education by proposing ideas to strengthen our system and improve educational outcomes for Oklahoma students,” said House Speaker Jeff Hickman. “This plan builds on the commitment we made to retired teachers, while also keeping or bringing back quality, experienced educators to Oklahoma classrooms.”

To prevent a measure from negatively impacting the OTRS, the legislation must be examined. If it does increase the liability of the fund, the Legislature must fund the proposal.

HB 1061 will be examined for its possible impact on the OTRS. The proposal would offset the negative fiscal impact to the retirement system of raising the cap by $3,000, the employer contribution rate would be increased from 9.5 percent to 11 percent for retirees who are rehired.

“Our goal is to provide an incentive to keep our best teachers in the classroom and bring some of our retired teachers back, while keeping costs low for our schools,” McDaniel said. “We believe this is another way to deal with the national shortage without harming the financial strength and security of the OTRS, which House Republicans have worked hard to improve during the last decade.”

The review is expected to be complete before the end of the year. Its information will be used when HB 1061 is considered during the next legislative session.


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