The details
The lawsuit was filed by the Houston Federation of Teachers in a Harris County court on July 30, according to the filing.
The lawsuit is coming about a month after HISD board managers approved the district’s compensation plan for the 2025-26 school year, which bases teacher pay raises on their performance.
According to the filing, HFT officials are alleging HISD officials misused funding included in HB 2 that was set aside to fund teacher pay raises for the next two school years.
HISD officials defended the district’s new compensation plan in a July 30 statement.
“The teacher pay-for-performance system represents the most significant increase in individual teacher compensation,” officials said in the statement. “The pay-for-performance system recognizes that the single most important factor in student achievement is teacher effectiveness and rewards teachers for their positive impact on student success."
A closer look
The lawsuit alleges HISD officials have not complied with portions of HB 2 that set aside $2,500 raises for teachers with at least three years of experience and $5,000 raises for teachers with at least five years of experience.
"Rather than passing along the state-funded salary increase to all its eligible teachers through a salary increase, HISD adopted a compensation plan for 2025-26 that does not include the Teacher Retention Allotment," the lawsuit states. "HISD has apparently determined that it does not need to follow the statute as written but will use the state funds for performance bonuses or other purposes."
The lawsuit also alleges that since HB 2 didn’t include an exemption for HISD, the district is improperly distributing the funds.
What’s next
While the lawsuit also requested a temporary restraining order to be placed against the district to prevent officials from spending the funds on anything other than teacher pay raises, court documents show the request was denied July 30.
“We are pleased with today's ruling and believe that the judge followed the law in denying HFT's request for a temporary restraining order,” HISD officials said in a statement.
HISD has yet to file a response to the lawsuit. District officials are set to appear in court Aug. 7.
