The Education Budget has been the most hotly discussed topic across the state during the 2014 legislative session. The issue spearheading the debate is a pay raise for teachers, who have only received a 2% increase since 2008.

The House passed their budget a few weeks ago which didn't include the raise that Governor Bentley had advocated for.

The specifics of the House budget were:

• No pay raise for teachers.
• $38 million to PEEHIP (teacher health insurance) for active and retired employees to help with the rise in premiums due to the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare).
• Increase of 1% in the middle school divisor, which will decrease the size of the classroom and allow for hiring of 400 new teachers across the State.
• Increase of $14.7 million in the “Other Current Expense” (OCE) fund, and allowing the local school systems to best determine the use of those funds.
• Increase of $5.7 million in funding for textbooks.
• Increase of $8.7 million in funding for transportation.
• Increase of $605k in funding for classroom supplies.
• Increase of $10 million in funding for Alabama’s pre-k program.
• Increase of $6 million in funding for the career-technical dual enrollment program.

The budget was then worked on by a conference committee of House and Senate members.

The specifics of the Senate budget are:

• No pay raise for teachers.
• $64 million to fund PEEHIP.
• Funding to add approximately 80 new teachers.
• Increase of $11 million in funding for transportation.
• Increase of $10 million for the state's Pre-K program.

While the pay increase was the issue on the forefront for AEA, the increase in PEEHIP (teacher health insurance) has skyrocketed since the passage of The Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) and seemed to be the chief concern of the Senate.

"After much haggling and negotiation the Senate concurred with the conference report to pass the education budget. I was very pleased to have successfully lobbied for full funding for PEEHIP which means that education employees will have no out of pocket expense for their insurance. I want to be clear that there is no bill that I could have voted on today that contemplates a pay raise. That would have to be a separate bill outside of the budget and there was not one on the floor today. For now I am glad to keep education funded and out of pocket expenses avoided."

- Senator Phil Williams

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The Senate passed their version of the budget by a vote of 18-16 on Tuesday night. The budget will now be sent back to the House to be voted on before being sent to Governor Bentley's desk.

Southern Torch will have more details on the Education Budget once it passes the House vote.