School Committee approves $45.5 million budget amid economic uncertainty

Apr 28, 2020

On April 27, the School Committee approved a $45.5 million budget for fiscal year 2021 amid unprecedented economic uncertainty caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

“There’s so much unknown right now, both at the federal level, state level, at the local level,” noted School Business Administrator Jim Kiely, adding, “this dramatic change in revenue...is going to be a problem for us.”

“It’s impossible to understand or predict what’s going to happen with the funding for next year,” he said.

But, he added, the town “is attempting to continue with the process and stay on track as best they can.”

The figure represents a 3.2 percent increase over 2020's budget that, in its February draft form, was already falling short by hundreds of thousands of dollars even before the pandemic took hold.

Kiely noted at a meeting on February 10 that the $45.5 million figure and what the town anticipates in offering the School Department for its budget is off by “several hundred thousand dollars.” He did stress that number is a “moving target.”

Yet there are very few new additions to the district budget. 

There will be no new positions added next year, although there are a handful of positions that will need to be filled — such as the music director position, which will be taken by former brass specialist for the district Ian Flint. And the town has enacted a freeze on nonessential spending during the coronavirus emergency.

Kiely noted that the budget represents the district’s attempt to maintain a “level service.” 

“Really we’re looking to maintain all of the good things we do now as best we can, and focus on that level service,” he told the committee in February. 

This year there was also $780,490 in unfunded budget requests from school administrators, which ranged from a new social worker at the high school, specialists and teacher assistants at the middle school, and additional teachers at the elementary schools.

The School Committee approved the total budget of $45,586,735 on April 27 before presenting it to the Finance Committee for discussion on April 28.