Socorro ISD employees face skyrocketing health insurance costs after failed tax proposal

by Claudia Lorena Silva, El Paso Matters
November 7, 2025

Some Socorro Independent School District employees will see their health insurance premiums skyrocket, reducing their take-home pay, after voters this week rejected a tax ratification proposal that would have generated up to $49.2 million for the district.

The district had planned to infuse $5 million from the increased revenue into its health fund to keep the cost of employee health insurance down. But SISD voters on Tuesday narrowly defeated the district’s proposal, known as VATRE, or voter approval tax ratification election.  

On Wednesday, the SISD school board voted unanimously to adopt a health plan that will raise some employee premiums by $45 to $650 a month, depending on the plan in which they enroll.

“Given the fragile state of our finances, this is the responsible decision for the district,” said David Solis, SISD’s chief financial officer.

SISD’s open enrollment period runs from Nov. 10 to Dec. 6, and the new plans and rates would be effective in January. District officials said during the meeting they will send employees phone and text reminders to review their plan options and select the best one for them. 

Veronica Hernandez, president of the Socorro American Federation of Teachers, said she was not surprised by the board’s decision after the tax ratification failed.

“After the VATRE, we knew there were going to be consequences. We know we’ve got no money, and we know health insurance is going up everywhere. So, I think it was no surprise to anybody, but it's a really hard pill to swallow,” Hernandez told El Paso Matters.

Rising health care costs, coupled with the possible end of the Affordable Care Act premium tax credits, are expected to significantly increase health care premiums nationwide.

SISD was already planning to change its health plan, which has operated under a budget deficit for several years. This means the district has spent more on employee health care than it made in deductibles.

In past years, the district resorted to its savings to cover these costs. But after nearly a decade of spending more than it makes and operating under budget deficits as enrollment dropped and state revenue remained stagnant, the district depleted its reserves.

Without changes to its health care plan, the district’s health fund would have had a $25 million deficit, said Celina Stiles, SISD’s chief human resource officer.

Health care plan changes

SISD plans to reduce the number of health care plans it offers from three to two, and increase the cost of co-pays, deductibles and out-of-pocket maximums. This will save the district $5.6 million annually on its health plan.

Premiums for most employee health plans will go up, except those enrolled in the consumer driven health plan (CDHP) without children or a spouse, which will continue to be free. The plan combines a high-deductible insurance with a Health Savings Account, or HSA, a type of savings account used for medical care.

SISD’s health insurance plans will no longer cover GLP-1 medication, such as Ozempic, for weight loss, but will still cover it for diabetes. This will bring a one-time savings of $2.1 million, officials said.

SISD will also try to encourage employees to move to its CDHP plan by increasing the district’s monthly contribution for those plans from $555 to $655. All other plans will continue to get a monthly contribution from the district of $555. The district will also increase its annual contribution to employees’ HSAs from $800 to $1,200.

The increased contributions are expected to cost SISD $1 million a year.

The president of the West Texas Alliance, Rosie Perez, said this will be an added strain for employees who already saw their premiums increase at the start of the year after the school board voted in 2024 to reduce its contributions to employee health coverage.

“When they had to make a very similar decision a year ago, I heard from employees that they were going to have to make significant changes to other areas of their budgets just because of the increase in insurance,” Perez told El Paso Matters. “We lost members because they had to decide whether to pay for their membership with us, or to pay for the health insurance increases.”

Despite these changes, Perez said SISD still offers some of the best health plans for school employees in El Paso.

“The contribution that they give towards the health care plans is still significantly higher than Clint (ISD), and it's very comparable to Ysleta (ISD.) The compensation piece is probably one of the best compared to the other two districts, based on the base pay for teachers,” Perez said.

Hernandez said employee morale was already low before Proposition A failed.

“They just don’t see any way out. They are struggling to make ends meet,” Hernandez said. “I don’t see any light at the end of the tunnel. I’m worried about our future.”

Cash-flow issues beyond health insurance

Most of the changes approved by the board Wednesday would have been adopted if the proposition had been approved, but the $5 million infusion would have allowed the district to reduce premiums for some employees, district officials said. Others would have seen increases ranging from $80 to $500 a month.

The proposal on the ballot asked voters whether to authorize an increase to the operations portion of the district’s tax rate beyond what’s allowed by the state, while reducing the debt payment portion of the tax rate by an equal amount.

With the state’s increased school tax exemption approved by Texas voters Tuesday, most district homeowners would have seen reduced school tax bills even if the VATRE had passed.

SISD planned to use the funds generated by the proposition to rebuild its savings, replace broken or outdated student laptops and repair its air conditioning system.

Andrew Kim, one of the Texas Education Agency conservators overseeing the district, told the board that regardless of its vote on the health care premiums, the district still has a cash-flow problem to address.

“There will be an anticipation of borrowing – additional short-term loans – to cover our payroll costs, potentially up to about $30 million coming up,” Kim said. “So this does not solve it all at once.”

SISD leaders said they will likely call for another tax ratification election in November 2026 to boost the district’s revenue in the future.

“We can only do this during a November election. So, what we’re going to do is just analyze the results of this election and look at our steps moving forward. This need is still there, so, it’s highly likely we will need to go out for one in the future,” SISD Superintendent James Vasquez said during a news conference before the meeting.

Though TEA conservators previously said the remaining duration of their stay may depend on the outcome of the election, Kim noted that it is not a part of the exit criteria that the district needs to complete for them to leave.

“This is a hiccup, but this is not one of the exit criteria,” Kim said. “What is still a concern is how we go and make sure the finances of the district are at a point where it is balanced, where it is reasonable, is doable, and is sustainable.”

This article first appeared on El Paso Matters and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.