It appears that there is some confusion regarding the budgetary process between the Gateway Regional School District and some individuals in our member towns. This was made clear at Blandford’s Annual Town Meeting and in correspondence since then between some members of the Gateway Towns Advisory Committee (GTAC) and the district regarding the passage of town assessments.
The primary questions revolve around the adoption and ratification of the budget and town assessments and what constitutes ‘passing’ a budget at an Annual Town Meeting. The legal answers to these questions are provided in M.G.L., Chapter 71, Section 16B (Budgets and Apportionment of Expenses in Regional School Districts). In essence this law outlines the adoption, approval, assessments, and rights of all parties in the budget process.
This process begins with the school committee, which must have 2/3rds of the total number of seats on the committee (in our case we need 12 members) vote to adopt the amounts necessary to operate the school district. This amount is then apportioned to the towns and certified by the district treasurer. At their Annual Town Meetings, the towns then vote these apportionments, also known as ‘assessments’. A simple majority vote by those present at Annual Town Meeting is needed to pass the budget. The district needs 2/3rds of its member towns to pass their assessments in order for the budget to be approved (in our case that number is now four out of six towns).
As has occurred in the recent past, the school budget may remain the same, yet the district may certify new assessment amounts based upon anticipated changes in revenue. Specifically, the issue in Blandford was two-fold. First, the town did not post the amount certified by the district on its warrant for the town meeting, rather they used an amount the finance committee felt the town could support. The second was that the Chair of the School Committee (also a Blandford resident) put forward an amendment to the school budget that was different from the originally certified assessment amount and that was slightly higher ($27,000) than the amount the town put on their warrant. The voters at Blandford’s Annual Town Meeting easily passed this amendment.
This has raised the issue of whether Blandford actually passed the district budget. As part of their budget adoption process, the school committee voted that any mitigation funding (funding that could be awarded by the state to ease the impact of Worthington’s withdrawal) would be used to reduce town assessments. Given the district’s conversations with legislators, it was felt that there is hope that the district will receive $630,000 in mitigation funding and therefore proposed that a town could vote the revised assessment figures if so desired. Thus, there is some ambiguity surrounding if such a vote actually “passes” the budget – if the school does receive mitigation funds, then the town would not have to revote a new assessment figure and could allow their vote to stand, thus accepting the assessment and by extension the budget. If the district does not receive mitigation funds, then the vote would not be considered as passing the budget and the school committee would need to begin the process of adopting a new budget.
The law is clear that whenever the school committee adopts a budget that allows the district treasurer to recertify an equal or lower assessment amount than previously accepted by town meeting, that town does not have to hold a new meeting. Thus, for any town that votes either the first certified amount, or their assessment based upon mitigation funding, if that mitigation funding comes to fruition, those towns would not need to vote to approve a new assessment amount as the new amounts would be equal to, or less than, the amount needed for the budget.
If four towns do not approve an assessment necessary to pass the budget, then the school committee must reconsider the budget. Under the law, the school committee may adopt a new budget that is the same as the original budget, lower than the original budget, or higher than the original budget. Should the new budget, and resulting assessments, be equal to or lower than the amounts approved at town meetings, then those towns would not have to revote as they would have already allocated enough funds to pay their share of the budget. This doesn’t prevent towns from holding a special meeting to reconsider an earlier vote; it just eliminates the necessity to do so.
As everyone knows, this has been a difficult year in many ways due to the large number of unknowns surrounding the district and budgetary issues. As we continue, I’m hopeful that we are able to resolve the unknowns and that we’ll find we have a budget that allows us to support the education of all of our students.
