MONTEVIDEO, Minn. – In the middle of summer, January seems like the distant future to many. But that’s not the case for school superintendents who are already thinking about 2015 – and searching for ways to bring their districts into compliance with the nation’s new health law, commonly known as “Obamacare.”

Beginning next year, “employers, including school districts, with more than 50 employees must extend benefits to anyone working 30 hours a week or they may face hefty fines under the federal Affordable Care Act,” reports AustinDailyHerald.com.

That means school districts will be offering health insurance to many part-time workers, such as substitute teachers, counselors, teaching assistants and nutrition workers, the news site reports.

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In Minnesota, the federal rules are expected to drive up school districts’ health insurance costs by $200 million a year, according to Minnesota Management and Budget.

To sidestep those added expenses, some district leaders are looking at cutting their part-timers’ workloads to under 30 hours a week, and making up the difference by hiring a few more of them.

Others will simply cut hours, enact a hiring freeze and get along as best they can.

Luther Heller, superintendent of the Montevideo school system, tells AustinDailyHerald.com that if he offers health insurance to his 80 part-time employees, it’ll cost about $350,000 a year. He calls that “a very sizeable increase.”

“We don’t have an extra $300,000 that we’re just not using for anything,” Heller says.

Leaders of Minnesota’s Austin Public Schools will offer insurance to newly eligible employees, but will require them to pay for all of it. Such an approach will likely result in hefty fines from the federal government, but district leaders think “it will be cheaper for the district to pay the fine than to cover more employees,” reports AustinDailyHerald.com.

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The bottom line is that schools everywhere are being forced to decide between cutting employees’ hours (which would result in fewer adults to help teach and supervise students) or cutting other expenses (possibly student programs and activities) to provide part-timers with health insurance – or to pay the federal fine.

If superintendents are lucky, maybe state lawmakers will give them more K-12 money to cover the costs and pass the added expenses on to the already beleaguered taxpayers.

The Affordable Care Act was sold to the American people as a way to provide health insurance to everyone and to drive down overall health care spending. But now that the law is ready to take full effect, Americans are seeing their health insurance bills go up and up – and they’re learning that providing health insurance to everyone comes at a very big cost.

“There’s no such thing as a free lunch” may be an old saying, but it still holds true.