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I personally want to thank Mrs. Bynum and Mrs.
Lindsey, my teachers, for their influence in my life. It is because
of them and so many other teachers I meet on a daily basis that I
fight for them every day
for the respect they deserve and for a commitment that our state
must make to them and our
students."
During the session on public school finance, Rep. Hopson authored HB
29, which would have restored the $1,000 teacher health insurance
reimbursement and passed it through directly into teachers’ and
school employees’ paychecks, with no HRAs. Even though the bill had
broad bipartisan support, the leadership did not allow the bill to
come to the House Floor for a vote. This all could have been avoided
during the summer special session by passing my bill, House Bill 29,
which would have eliminated HRAs altogether and restored the $500 cut to teacher’s reimbursement,” said Rep. Hopson.
In 2001, Rep. Hopson helped create Texas’ first statewide health
insurance program for teachers, but during the regular session the
Legislature broke a
promise to our school employees by reducing the
reimbursement from
$1,000 to $500, a measure that Rep. Hopson
strongly opposed. Rep.
Hopson said that the Legislature’s promise to teachers remains
broken until the health insurance reimbursement is fully restored.
“We have a teacher shortage in Texas right now. We need to do
everything we can to keep our most experienced teachers and attract
talented new educators. I will continue to work with my colleagues
and teacher organizations to abolish HRAs altogether and restore the
supplement back to $1,000.”
Persons may contact Rep. Hopson’s office at
1-866-233-5100 or 512-463-0592.
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