The Texas House Pensions, Investments, and Financial Services Committee (PIFS) met today, and received invited testimony from the Teacher Retirement System’s (TRS) Executive Director, Brian Guthrie.
Guthrie provided an overview of TRS’s operations and pension fund. According to Guthrie, the pension trust fund is worth more than $210 billion, with more than two million total members in the system. Additionally, TRS now pays out more than $1 billion per month to retirees.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (D – Dallas), the Vice-Chair of PIFS, asked Guthrie about the impact that SB 2, the school education savings account (ESA) bill, could have on the pension fund.
Guthrie said that TRS conducted a study about SB 2. He said that similar bills passed in Arizona and Florida and that they didn’t see “an overall decline in active member population.” Guthrie said that over the last 10 years, Texas has seen its active member population grow by one to two percent each year.
Plesa told Guthrie that her notes said there was more than a 3% decline in the number of teachers since ESAs went into place in Arizona. Guthrie and Plesa decided to discuss the discrepancy in their information outside of the meeting.
Rep. John Bryant (D – Dallas) also questioned Guthrie about the impact that ESAs had in Florida. According to Bryant, that Florida saw the number of homeschool children increase by 58.6% over the four years since introducing ESAs, and that increase led to less public-school classroom teachers. Guthrie said that TRS isn’t the expert in homeschooling and that TRS is working off of the numbers provided by the Texas Education Agency. With those numbers, Guthrie said the projection showed that SB 2 wouldn’t have a “material impact” on the fund.
Rep. Stan Lambert (R – Abilene), the Chair of PIFS, asked Guthrie about how far behind retirees are in cost-of-living due to inflation after the 13th check and cost-of-living increase passed last session.
“Each retiree situation is different,” said Guthrie. “But even with (last session’s increases), there’s still some buying power that has not been addressed.”
TRTA is thankful to the members of the PIFS committee for making TRS a focus during their first meeting this session. It shows a level of dedication and support to TRS member, both retired and active. The legislative session is in full swing and there are many issues TRTA members want to know about, including the protection of the TRS fund’s solvency and passing additional benefit enhancements. These will be a part of many future discussions and updates.
¡Gracias!
Asegúrate de Danos like en facebook, follow us on Instagram, Síganos en Twitter y suscríbete a nuestro canal de youtube.
