TEMPLE, Texas — House Bill 3, which, in part, increases teacher salaries, is now a law.
"It's to the tune of, depending on whose numbers you look at, it's either $10 billion or $11.5 billion or somewhere in between," Texas Rep. Hugh Shine said.
Belton Independent School District discussed the new law Monday at its monthly board meeting before planning to adopt the new budget and salary schedule in July.
Shine said the bill's purpose is two-fold: To increase funding to certain programs and salaries for teachers across the state.
“I think the intent of the legislature is there as to what we expect school districts to do and we'll leave that up to the school districts and superintendents to do,” Shine said.
The bill will also serve as a property tax relief measure with the expectation school districts will drop their tax rates.
"Under the House Bill 3 passage, the Belton ISD tax rate will be reduced to a little over $1.06, which is about an 8.69% decrease," Belton ISD CFO, Jennifer Land said.
As for where that funding is coming from, Shine said in the initial stages, it will come from a variety of state-level sources, including the rainy day fund.
“What we've done is we increased the revenue dollars at the state level so we can funnel that down at the local level to the schools," Shine said.
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