NORTH CAROLINA -- Teacher pay will remain unchanged after lawmakers on Tuesday failed to override the governor's veto of a teacher pay bill tied to the ongoing budget stalemate.
- The bill would have raised teacher pay by 3.9 percent
- Democrats objected to a provision that would have raised pay further if they agreed to override Gov. Roy Cooper's budget veto
- The state Senate could still vote on the budget veto when lawmakers return at the end of April
The bill would have raised the pay of both teachers and school staff by 3.9 percent, or 4.4 percent if they agreed to override Gov. Roy Cooper's veto of the state budget. This incentive to cross the aisle drew the ire of several Senate Democrats, who accused Republicans of using teachers as political pawns.
“This one's got another hook in it that makes it even more distasteful, if we take a chance to bite on it, and it tells us that this pay raise is sort of a phantom,” Senate Minority Leader Dan Blue said. “Let's go back to the drawing board and do a meaningful increase in teacher pay.”
The teacher pay bill was one of a number of what insiders call “mini budget bills” designed to fund specific programs. North Carolina's budget normally is contained within a single omnibus spending bill. Republicans started passing them after Cooper, a Democrat, vetoed the state budget at the end of June. Cooper approved most of the mini budget bills but rejected the teacher pay bill, saying it was not enough and criticizing the provision meant to peel off Democratic votes.
On Tuesday afternoon, all 21 Senate Democrats voted as a bloc to sustain the governor's veto. Republicans accused them of bowing to the interests of teachers' unions rather than doing what was right for all teachers and students. They noted teachers have received pay raises in past years where other state employees, such as corrections officers, have not.
“We're not looking at the entire picture, we're not looking at where the needs are, we are ignoring the real needs in the face of politics, pure and simple, and that, quite frankly, disgusts me,” Chowan County Republican Sen. Rob Steinburg said.
Tuesday's vote leaves unanswered the question of the fate of the governor's main budget veto. Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger said he's not ruling out an override attempt when lawmakers come back at the end of April. The state House already overrode the governor in September, so a successful Senate override vote would mean the budget would become law. Berger also said he wants to continue working on mini budget bills.
Under state law, since the state legislature and the governor have not agreed on a budget, programs will continue to be funded at the previous year's levels, except for the ones for which new mini budget bills have been approved.