This bill amends existing law (RCW 28A.150.410) to set specific minimum statewide average salary allocations for basic education staff and to change related procedures. It requires that by the 2018-19 school year the state allocation for certificated instructional staff provide a statewide average of $64,000 and for certificated administrative staff a statewide average of $95,000, both adjusted for inflation from the 2017-18 school year. It phases in new statewide average allocations for classified staff: $67,325 beginning 2025-26 and $73,384 beginning 2026-27 (both adjusted by inflation from 2023-24), and beginning 2027-28 it sets classified administrative staff at $99,164 (adjusted from 2026-27) and other classified staff at $79,988 (adjusted from 2023-24). The bill defines “classified administrative staff” and “other classified staff,” and uses the definition of “inflation” in RCW 28A.400.205. The bill also adds procedural changes. Starting in 2018-19 it requires state salary allocations to be regionally adjusted, with the omnibus appropriations act specifying those adjustments through at least 2022-23, and it bases 2018-19 through 2022-23 regionalization factors on median single-family residential values as described in RCW 28A.150.412. Beginning with the 2023-24 school year and every four years thereafter the minimum salary allocations and regionalization factors must be reviewed and rebased under RCW 28A.150.412. The bill references RCW 28A.150.412 and RCW 28A.400.205 and affects the Superintendent of Public Instruction, school districts, and the basic education program. The excerpt contains deleted prior text and refers to other statutes; the detailed mechanism for converting statewide average allocations into district-level allocations or full surrounding statutory language is not included in the provided text.

If enacted, the law would raise the state’s minimum salary allocations for teachers, certificated administrators, and several classes of classified employees in stages and require those allocations to be adjusted for inflation and for regional differences in hiring costs. Practically, that means the state will need to provide larger, phased increases in funding earmarked for staff salaries, and school districts—especially those in higher-cost areas—are likely to receive higher state salary allocations. Districts could see reduced pressure to find local funding for baseline pay, but they will still face decisions about how to use the money within local salary schedules and collective bargaining; if state allocations do not fully cover local market rates, districts could still experience cost pressures. The groups most affected are school districts and their employees (certificated instructional and administrative staff, and classified staff), plus the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction and the Legislature through the omnibus appropriations act that will set regional adjustments. The statute leaves out key implementation details: how statewide averages translate into district-level dollar amounts, the exact mechanics of regionalization beyond referencing other RCWs, and the operational steps for applying these increases, so there is uncertainty about how quickly and fully local pay will change and how large the state’s budgetary commitment will ultimately be.