AUSTIN — While there are plenty of hot-button items on Gov. Greg Abbott’s agenda for the upcoming special legislative session, those related to public education could be among the touchiest.

Abbot’s agenda includes a prohibition of taxpayer dollars to collect union dues, school choice for special needs students, a $1,000 raise for teachers, administrative flexibility in teacher hiring and retention, plus a school-finance reform commission.

The agenda will in several cases pit public-school education associations against conservatives, some of whom are reintroducing proposals that didn’t gain traction in the regular session.

Sarah Tober, communications director for Texas office of the National Federation of Independent Business Advocates, said allowing teachers to deduct dues from paychecks supports organizations that negatively affect business.

Stephanie Matthews at the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation also wants to ban teacher dues collection, saying that allowing it amounts to “full-on tax-payer funded lobbying.”

A bill that prohibited dues deductions for teachers, but allowed other public employees, including police officers, to continue the practice, failed to pass in this year’s regular session. 

Ed Martin, public affairs director for the Texas State Teachers Association, said that the state can already bill organizations for the cost of deducting dues, something that can be done once a year on a computer in a few minutes. 

“I could deduct for a health spa,” but not educational organization dues if the proposal were enacted, Martin said. “It’s not costing taxpayers anything. It’s a non-issue.”

As for school choice and special needs students, “we were ecstatic to hear the governor focus on this,” Matthews said. 

Matthews said that teacher organizations that oppose giving parents more choices are “protecting a system,” not helping children. 

But said Julleen Bottoms, a Corsicana teacher who is president of the Association of Texas Professional Educators, “if you are going to send our money to private schools, lets’s hold them accountable, just like we do public schools.”

Bottoms, who teaches technology applications to kindergarten and elementary pupils, said that vouchers aren’t likely to cover the cost of  “choice” at schools that aren’t publicly funded.

“It’s a gateway,” Bottoms said. “Next time they’re going to want to expand it.”

Gary G. Godsey, ATPE’s executive director, called the proposal a direct attack on public education.

“The lieutenant governor and the governor want to privatize public education,” Godsey said. “Any time you offer privatization, the dam gets opened to additional water flowing through it.”

And while it’s hard to imagine anyone looking askance at a $1,000 raise, Godsey said that given the fact that there’s no new money for the proposal, it amounts to an unfunded mandate.

Martin said that without additional funding to cover its $350 million annual cost, such a raise is a “phantom.” 

Matthews said “we need to improve academics while being more efficient,” adding said that districts could cover the cost of raises by being “more resourceful.”

Bottoms said she wouldn’t mind a little extra money, but “not if someone’s going to lose their job.”

As for flexibility, Matthews backs giving administrators who don’t “have full ability to hire and fire teachers as they please,” options, she said. 

“If you’re not doing your job, there should be accountability,” Matthews said. 

Godsey said he wasn’t sure what the point of the flexibility item is.

“Most districts already only sign one-year contracts,” Godsey said. “There’s huge flexibility.”

Of all the items, public-school funding is the most complex and least-subject to a quick fix.

Godsey said that Texas is adding 80,000 students — the equivalent of a district the size of Fort Worth’s — to Texas public schools every year.

At the same time, rising property taxes, of which school taxes are typically the largest part, continue to dismay owners.

Meanwhile, the state is paying about 38 percent of the cost, when at one time, it covered at least 50 percent of the cost.

“The state share has been declining for two decades,” Martin said.  According to the National Education Association, Texas is 38th in the nation in public-education spending per-pupil.

“If we ever get serious,” about school-finance reform, Godsey said, “it’ll take more than one session.”

John Austin covers the Texas Statehouse for CNHI’s newspapers and websites. Reach him at jaustin@cnhi.com.