Sen. Nancy Spence’s push to fund performance-based pay for public schoolteachers statewide was turned back by the Senate Education Committee’s four Democrats today. The defeat came despite testimony that such policies boost achievement and already work well in two of the state’s largest school districts.

Spence’s Senate Bill 141 would have helped all of the state’s 178 school districts as well as independent charter schools develop their own performance-pay plans, much like programs now in place in Denver and Douglas County schools. The bill set basic standards for programs devised by the districts but allowed them free rein to work out details.

“Exceptional teachers deserve exceptional pay,” Spence told committee members.

The program also mirrored new Democrat Gov. Bill Ritter’s own pledge, in his “Colorado Promise” campaign platform, to support performance pay. Yet, that didn’t stop the committee from killing the proposal on a party-line vote in what Spence afterward called “a slap in the face to their own governor.”

While sidestepping a stand on performance pay itself, committee Democrats as well as a representative of the state’s largest teachers union had objected to a provision in Spence’s proposal that would tap the State Education Fund for the $10 million to fund her bill.

“We do not have the money at the state level to do this,” Sen. Suzanne Williams, D-Aurora.

The State Education Fund is projected to have a $210 million balance by the end of the current fiscal year. Spence, who is ranking Republican on the committee, offered to amend her own bill to take the money out of the state’s General Fund budget instead, but committee members wouldn’t go for that approach, either.

“There was no way some committee members were going to support this no matter where the money came from,” Spence said after her measure was defeated.

Spence had chided committee Democrats for caring more about a particular pool of money than about quality in the classroom.

“It’s always about the money; it’s never about the teachers,” she said.

An education policy researcher from a local think tank told the committee that research shows performance pay has boosted student achievement in Florida and in Little Rock, Ark. A representative of a group representing the state’s charter schools also testified for the measure. Committee Republicans backed Spence’s proposal as an incentive for boosting performance in class and disputed Democrats’ claims there isn’t enough money.

“We need to prioritize our scarce resources to drive our teacher quality,” said Republican Sen. Mike Kopp of Littleton. “There is a nexus between competition and quality.”