Effort to keep S.C. teachers in the class after retiring moves forward

A state Senate panel OK'd a proposal Wednesday to stem an anticipated exodus of teachers from S.C. schools, which are at risk of losing about 3,376 employees next school year as a popular retirement program ends.

That same panel also agreed to allow retired law enforcement to come back to work but only as school resource officers or instructors at the state's Criminal Justice Academy.

The legislation, proposed by state Sen. Mike Fanning, D-Fairfield, now moves to the full Senate Finance Committee.

The proposal is a response to the looming end of a popular state retirement program — the Teacher and Employee Retention Incentive, or TERI. That program ends June 30, and 6,630 public-sector employees could leave their jobs for retirement.

Those workers could stay on the job. But few are expected to because of an S.C. law that says working retirees cannot collect their retirement benefits if they are paid more than $10,000 for their jobs.

An anticipated staffing shortage across state government, state agencies and school districts — many of which have trouble recruiting and retaining workers — has pushed lawmakers to remove the $10,000 pay cap or allow retirees to collect their retirement benefits while still working.

“We need to get this done and move on," said state Sen. John Scott, D-Richland. "We’ve beat this horse to death.”

Teachers, who enrolled in the TERI program before Nov. 1, 2017, could stay on the job without a cap on their pay, under Fanning's bill.

The legislation also would exempt other educators — principals, assistant principals and library media specialists — who stay on the job from the earnings cap if they work in an area or teach a subject where there is a critical need.

Expanding that exemption to educators who are not teachers would cost the state an added $2.2 million a year, lawmakers were told Wednesday.

"Just in nine (school) districts in my neck of the woods, 75 percent of our library media specialists are within five years of retirement," Fanning said Thursday. "There's only one library media program in the state of South Carolina — and that's at USC (the University of South Carolina) — and they're not cranking out enough even for my nine districts."

Proposal could put more SROs in schools

Retired police officers also could return to work under the proposal.

Police officers, who are enrolled in the Police Officers Retirement System and retired before January 2018, also would be exempted from the $10,000 pay cap. However, those officers could return to work only as an instructor at the state's Criminal Justice Academy or a school resource officer.

That could help put school resource officers in nearly 600 S.C. public schools that lack a police officer now.

Placing resource officers in all S.C. schools has become a priority since last month's Florida high school shooting that killed 17.

State Sen. Sean Bennett, R-Dorchester, said if school workers are exempted from the $10,000 pay cap, law enforcement officers should be treated the same. "I just have to believe there are probably more or better critical needs than just resource officers and criminal justice (instructors)."

This story was originally published March 21, 2018 at 2:15 PM with the headline "Effort to keep S.C. teachers in the class after retiring moves forward."