January 2003

Here Comes the Texas Legislature

By Wade Jones
TPEA Director of Communications

The 2002 elections have come and gone and the convening of the 78th Texas Legislature is upon us. The Republicans swept the state, including the governor’s office, the Comptroller's office, the Lt. Governor and U.S. Senate. What does this changing of the guard in state government mean for the people of Texas and state employees in particular? As the old adage goes, it's still too early to tell.

How It Happened

The 78th Texas Legislature will present a face unseen in Texas politics since Reconstruction. But how did it happen? Redistricting is how. Every 10 years the Legislature redraws the voting districts to make adjustments for population shifts. If the Legislature can't reach a consensus on what the districts should look like, the Legislative Redistricting Board is tasked with the challenge, and in some cases, the courts get involved, as they did in 2001. When the newly drawn districts were finalized in 2002, they reflected the increasingly Republican leanings of the electorate. Add the composition of these new districts to strong Republican voting patterns in Texas and you have the first rolling pebble of the Republican landslide.

Once the smoke from the November 2002 elections cleared, the political landscape in Texas looked markedly different than in the past. Due to redistricting, every candidate for the legislature had to run a campaign to get elected or re-elected. That meant 150 House seats and 31 Senate seats were up for grabs. An across-the-board election brings with it a lot of speculation from both officials and the electorate. But it seems that most of the speculation was right.

This Republican victory marks a sea change in the Texas political landscape. Previously, the composition of the Texas Senate was 15 Democrats to 16 Republicans; after this election the makeup changed to 12 Democrats and 19 Republicans. An even more dramatic shift occurred in the House, where Democrats have long held the majority. The House changed from 78 Democrats and 72 Republicans to 62 Democrats and 88 Republicans. Due to this change in the majority, Republican Tom Craddick (Midland) is the presumptive Speaker of the House, the first Republican Speaker in 130 years. At a November 8, 2002, press conference in the Capitol, Rep. Craddick produced a list of 102 Democrats and Republicans who had pledged their support for him. (He needed only a simple majority of 76.) By the time the legislature convenes, this list will undoubtedly have grown tremendously.

During the press conference, Rep. Craddick spoke of his planned bipartisan leadership, appointing Democrats as well as Republicans to chairmanships, and a promise to give all House members a chance to get a vote on their legislation on the floor of the House if they can show serious support.

Rep. Craddick and the rest of the House and Senate face extremely challenging issues in this session of the Texas Legislature. One of the primary issues is, of course, balancing the state’s budget. Under the Texas constitution, the Legislature must adopt a balanced budget. If they can't, a special session may be called. TPEA's goal is to ensure that the budget isn't balanced on the backs of state employees, and that any employee group that receives state-funded health care be treated equally.

What It Means, Maybe

If you've read a newspaper or watched the news lately, you know Texas is facing tight budgetary times - to be specific, a projected budgetary shortfall of $5 to $12 billion. And in tight budgetary times, the Legislature looks at any and all avenues to decrease spending and balance the budget. According to most legislators we've talked to, “everything is on the table,” including health care benefits cuts and even job cuts. In the long run, these are all things Texas can't afford.

TPEA supports maintenance of the current health care benefits package for state employees - 100 percent coverage for the employee and 50 percent for dependents - and suggests that any cost savings that can be accrued through cost-cutting measures in other areas be applied to salary increases for state employees. TPEA also supports all measures that promote the state workforce as an asset. The Legislature would not let other state assets, like bridges and roads, fall into disrepair. They shouldn't let the state workforce crumble either. Items such as job cuts are not only bad for state employees but Texas’ taxpayers because these items deplete the state of its competent workforce and its ability to deliver services that taxpayers have paid for and expect.

Over the past dozen years, the state's overall compensation package has become significantly less competitive as compared to other similar employers. For years, the state used health care benefits as an incentive to hire and maintain staff in lieu of better salaries simply because, at the time, health care benefits were an inexpensive, cost-effective incentive. However, times have changed. Health care costs have skyrocketed in recent years and are expected to continue to become more expensive. According to the Texas Association of Business, health care premiums in Texas have increased 25 percent this year - more than twice the national average. And out-of-pocket expenses for employees are increasing as well, including increased co-pays.

Although we won't know the true severity of the budget crisis until the Comptroller reports the state revenue projections to the Legislature in January, we can safely assume that both the House and the Senate are closely examining state employee benefits, and with the impending budget crisis on everyone's radar screen, the case to be made for state employee salary increases becomes more challenging; but that doesn't negate the fact that state employees have received only THREE across-the-board pay raises in the past decade and state employee salaries lag behind other employers by an average of 14 percent, according the State Auditor's Office (To see the Auditor's report, go to http://www.sao.state.tx.us/reports/report.cfm?report=2002/03-701).

Below-market salaries coupled with eroding employee health care benefits are primary causes behind state employee turnover, which will undoubtedly increase in the future when the economy recovers. High employee turnover severely decreases the state's ability to meet the demands of taxpayers.

TPEA's goal is to minimize any effects of cost-cutting or cost-shifting procedures and to make the highest priority of preserving benefits for employees who have chosen a career with the state of Texas, and to ensure that any savings that are generated by those procedures be reapplied to state employee salary increases. Several cost cutting proposals have been put forward by ERS or are already being discussed to reduce health care costs for the state of Texas, but without significantly affecting full-time, classified state employee health care benefits:

- Eliminating state-paid health insurance premium for appointed board and commission members. Boards and commission members are appointed and usually employed full- time with other employers. Thus, the state is subsidizing the health care costs of individuals who are employed elsewhere.

- Reducing the state's health care contribution for part-time employees (employees who work 20 or more hours per week but less than 40 hours per week) to 50 percent of premium paid by state; 25 percent of dependent premium paid by state.

- Establishing a waiting period for health insurance for new employees.

- Mandatory generic prescriptions.

- Eliminating state-paid health insurance premiums for graduate assistants at higher education institutions.

- Requiring public community and junior colleges to contribute toward ERS UGIP (Uniform Group Insurance Program) based on overall proportionality. Currently, the state pays the premium for instructional staff and the college pays the other costs.

Last year, the state expanded health care coverage to public school district employees. This increased the state-funded health care pool by 600,000 people and health care spending increased overall by 39 percent in the current budget. Just as public school district employees and higher-ed staff now receive health care benefits similar to state employees, they should also be expected to bear similar burdens. TPEA believes that health care is the obligation of every employer and that state-sponsored health care for independent school district employees should be revisited by the Legislature. Any changes that occur regarding health care benefits must be equally borne by any employee group that receives state-funded health care.

Based on our EMPACT endorsements, TPEA fared well in this year's elections. However, the favorable election results do not overshadow the fact that this legislative session will be a challenging one. TPEA will continue to work with newly elected and incumbent legislators to move forward with our agenda of improved employee compensation and benefits, but we can't do it without your help. Start now by writing your legislators and plan visits to the Capitol during the week of March 10. This is a real opportunity for state employees to better educate the new state leadership on the value of the work you do and the value of a strong state workforce, and this is best done by communicating the value of what you do to your legislators. Write them, call them, e-mail them.