ACC Lobbying for Fair Share of Employee Healthcare Funds

Money for employee healthcare is a key issue ACC administration is talking to state representatives about during the 81st State Legislative session.

Members of the board of trustees, the president of ACC, and the office of External Affairs have all taken the time to call, send letters and talk face to face with central Texas state representatives about the issue of Proportionality.

Under the current state policy institutions of higher education receive funding for employ healthcare that matches or is proportional to the state funds the institution receives. ACC and other community colleges across the state receive much of their funding from local sources and they receive a smaller amount of state funds than larger four-year institutions. Therefore ACC and other community colleges do not receive the same amount of money for employee healthcare that larger four-year institutions do.

“Proportionality is being applied unfairly,” said Linda Young, Special Assistant to the President for External Affairs at ACC. If proportionality is once more included in the budget bill it could cost ACC $2.6 million in the coming two years. The money for employee healthcare has to come from somewhere says Young and that could mean higher tuition or more fees in the future.

In a letter sent to local state representatives signed by Dr. Stephen Kinslow, President of ACC, and Nan McRaven, Chairperson of the ACC Board of Trustees, the administration asks representatives to exclude proportionality from the budget bill and to support bills in the House (HB 2083) and Senate (SB 41) “which would resolve the Proportionality issue.”

“Those bills would say that this formula for figuring how we support benefits for faculty in higher education would not apply to community colleges which don’t get the same amount of funding that the four year (universities) do,” said Young.

“For our students to be successful we have to have top notch educators and we do and we want to continue to attract and retain our faculty and our administrators and professional staff,” said Nan McRaven, Chairperson of the ACC Board of Trustees. For ACC to attract and retain faculty and staff the college needs to be able to offer things like healthcare to its employees. McRaven says the issue of proportionality affects employees, students and the wider ACC community.

“If the state isn’t doing it (providing funds for healthcare) then it falls on our local community and that takes away dollars that we could be spending on our students,” says McRaven.