Whitman’s Select Board voted on Tuesday, April 23 to close the warrant for Town Meeting after removing two articles deemed unnecessary. The warrant includes dual budget to present to the annual Town Meeting to fund town departments while offering an override to close a $509,212 gap in the W-H Regional School District assessment.
Vice Chair Dan Salvucci attended the meeting virtually by phone.
Select Boards in both towns again reviewed their warrants in preparation for the Monday, May 6 town meetings. Hanson’s Select Board, which had already closed the warrant, held its annual run-through of the warrant at it’s meeting Tuesday night.
One side of Whitman’s budget is marked recommended by the Select Board with an override, including a 5 percent increase over last year’s assessment for the W-H Regional School District. The balance of the certified district assessment of $509,212 included in a warrant article for an override.
The second column of the dual budget includes Select Board recommendation without an override, which would include the district’s full certified assessment of 7.87 percent over last year, however reductions in staff in several departments were necessary in order to balance that budget without an override.
“The budget, in both scenarios, do not include any one-time funds to balance the budget,” said Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter. “As many of you know, the use of one-time funds to balance the budget is not recommended.”
The amount to be placed on the override, if it is voted at Town Meeting and the Town Election is $509,212 and the estimated tax increase, based on the current average residential single-family home with an assessed value of $470,190 is $95.38 a year, Carter said.
Board member Shawn Kain also provided an updated financial outlook for the town.
“For some of us, who have been living the budget over the last couple of months, we’ve been trying to stay in tune with this, but we know for an everyday person this stuff can be overwhelming,” he said.
With the permission of the moderator, the board is planning to discuss the override question first at Town Meeting, Kain outlined.
“What we decide at the very beginning of Town Meeting will kind of set our course of action for the rest of Town Meeting,” he said. “We want people to vote yes [on the override question]. That’s formally our recommendation. We want people to vote yes to put the override on the ballot. If you agree with the override or not, we want it to go to the ballot.”
If it is approved at the May 18 town elections, then the appropriation if the full 7.87 percent, with $509,212 coming from new revenue. If it fails at the ballot, “We basically reject the school assessment,” Kain said. It then sends it back to the School Committee, which can lead to some “complex scenarios.”
Chair Dr. Carl Kowalski said, if Hanson voted not to support the override, it would have the same effect.
If Town Meeting votes against placing the override on the ballot, the school assessment would be funded at the full 7.87 percent, however, Kain said, warning that in order to balance the budget at that point, it would have to be taken from other town services.
He also provided some background on how the town got here and “what to expect, moving forward.”
The town should also be proud of the way it has funded education since fiscal 2012. There are more teachers and a better student-to-teacher ratio with a better per-pupil funding level. But enrollment, which is directly connected to state funding, is down.
Current fiscal policy also prioritizes the school department and the budget process will keep the town on sound financial ground while the School Committee unanimously agreed with the plan and leadership in Hanson is on board, he said.
“So an override will be presented to support the school department, but the key point to remember is this – whether you agree with the override or not, we need to support it at Town Meeting and send it to the ballot,” Kain said. “Doing so would ensure we collectively move forward in a way that is financially sound.”
Carter also noted that, if the override failed on Town Meeting floor, it will still be on the ballot – and absentee ballots now going out include it – and the ballot question passes, the town has 90 days to hold another special Town Meeting.
“We’re hoping for sure that this article moves to the ballot,” Carter said. “And that’s all that the article is doing: putting it in front of all the taxpayers to decide.”
“If the override passes, no one-time money is in the budget. If the override fails, no one-time money is in the budget,” Kain said. “That’s why it keeps us on sound financial ground.”
Article 54, which the Select Board proposed to appropriate a sum of money from available free cash to reduce the amount to be raised through taxes in fiscal year 2025, but was not recommended by a unanimous vote of the Finance Committee was left to Town Meeting. An opioid settlement article, deemed unnecessary was also removed from the warrant
“This was a placeholder a couple of months ago,” Carter said of Article 54. “As I was working on the budget, there was a deficit of over $100,000, so I put this in just in case we needed to use free cash.”
She didn’t want to end up in that position because using free cash for that purpose is not recommended as a sound budgeting practice and revenues and additional cuts had not yet been reviewed at that time.
“The budget we have now is a level-funded budget, so this article is not needed for budgeting purposes, for the reason I put it on there, however the Finance Committee is not for the override, [and are] looking for a different way,” Carter said. They have suggested using a different funding source and she was unsure if the article was needed for their overall plans.
“I just wanted to be honest on everything,” she said. “I put it on there because we had a deficit, and we don’t have a deficit.”
While Carter made no recommendations on whether or not to take Article 54 off the warrant, Select Board members Shawn Kain made a motion to remove it.
While Kain said the Finance Committee had good intentions in their vote, he said he argued their vote against recommending Article 54 puts town departments at risk.
He said he likes and is proud of the budget that Carter and Assistant Town Administrator Kathleen Keefe put together and feels strongly that the town should be presented with that plan and make decisions based on that.
“I think what the Finance Committee is doing is undermining that,” he said.
Carter later explained that it was the lack of a specific dollar amount that prompted the Finance Committee’s action.
Kowalski said it also undermines the relationship that the schools and Select Board reached a few weeks ago when the chairs of both town select boards met with Superintended of Schools Jeff Szymaniak and School Committee Chair Beth Stafford.
“They came back toward us and they reduced their assessment with the knowledge that what we woud try to do is to provide for the difference in an override election and they were all for that,” Kowalski said, agreeing that Article 54 should be removed from the warrant. “It was kind of a surprise that the Finance Committee did not support it.”
Board member Laura Howe agreed and commended Carter for the work she has done on the budget and the solid footing she is providing for the town.
“I think we have to give credit to the School Department and to Beth Stafford for approaching us to try to close that divide we were developing between the town and the schools,” Kowalski said. “What the Finance Committee is doing doesn’t help that at all.”
The schools are visibly supporting the override to get the towns through the year.
“I think that the only way the override passes in both towns is if it’s very clear that both [select boards] and the schools agree that this is the right path forward,” Board member Justin Evans said. “Doing anything else doesn’t make sense to achieve what they’re trying to achieve.”
Evans questioned what the Finance Committee’s vote meant.
“They need it to meet their plan, but they’re not recommending it?” he asked.
The previous night, when meeting with the Finance Committee, Carter said she told them that, where the town has a balanced budget, the Select Board may find Article 54 is not needed.
“[Finance Chair] Rick Anderson said, ‘that’s fine, whatever you decide,’” she reported. “They always just vote against the articles if it just says ‘a sum of money’ … until a number is inserted.” Then they give their final recommendations on Town Meeting floor.
“I still think we want this article,” Evans said. “Not for the thing the Finance Committee’s attempting to pull off but because this is our safety net.”
Salvucci also counseled for removing the article.
“We’re taking away the choices of Town Meeting and the public,” he said. “If they want to fund the schools through an override, I think we should leave it on there so they can make that decision.”

WHITMAN – The Select Board, in a brief remote meeting Thursday, April 11, voted 4-0 to place an override question for an additional $509,212 in real estate and personal property taxes on the May 18 Town Election ballot. The override would fund a portion of the fiscal 2025 Whitman-Hanson Regional School District operating expense assessment.
Select Board member Laura Howe was unable to attend.
The cost to the average taxpayer would be $95.38 annually.
Chair Dr. Carl Kowalski said he spoke to both Superintendent of Schools Jeff Szymaniak and School Committee Chair Beth Stafford that morning and “they are definitely supporting this override that we want to place on the ballot.”
“They know that the Board of Selectmen will be, in the town warrant, be asking to place this on the ballot, and they are fully in favor of that,” he said.
The move came after the School Committee certified the $62,930,345 compromise budget – representing – on Monday, April 8 and announced the special remote meeting on Thursday.
The board also voted 4-0 to place a question on the Town Election ballot asking residents to vote on whether the elected treasurer-collector position should become an appointed one.
The present treasurer-collector is in favor of the change.
Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter said Treasurer-Collector Kenneth Litel “wants to speak on this on Town Meeting floor” on May 6.
“He is very much in favor of this,” she said. “Last time this was before the town, it did pass at Town Meeting, it did not pass at the ballot.”
During its regular meeting on Tuesday, April 9 meeting, the Select Board welcomed funds coming into the town coffers as representatives of Plymouth County Commissioners returned to Whitman to make a presentation of $34,000 in ARPA funds for the purchase of a new ambulance for the Fire Department. They had been to a Whitman Select Board meeting only a month or so ago to present $2.2 million in ARPA funds for a water/sewer project.
Commissioner Jared Valanzola, state Sen. Mike Brady and state Rep. Alyson Sullivan-Almeida attended the meeting for what Valanzola said was “for the moment” the final check presentation to Whitman.
“We want to thank Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter for working diligently to secure these funds,” he said. Whitman is the fourth town to reach its allocation cap, according to the commissioners.
“That’s not saying there won’t be more, depending on what other counties do, but you are the fourth town to cross the finish line, in terms of using all these funds,” Valanzola said, repeating his goal that none of the funds be returned to Washington, D.C.
While, he noted there had been some consternation about the county’s potential ability to efficiently handle CARES Act funds the commissioners handled it quicker, cheaper and faster than other counties.
“So far, we’ve done ARPA quicker, cheaper and more effectively,” he said. “We’re currently averaging 1 percent administrative costs, currently the national average is 7 to 10 percent.”
Brady agreed that Plymouth County did an excellent job.
“I know that the administration at the state level at the time didn’t want the county to control the money,” Brady said, adding he and Sullivan had supported the county in administering it.
Sullivan-Almeida thanked the Select Board, in turn, for its hard work.
“I know it’s not easy trying to find initiatives to use the money for, and I think it’s going to be a great thing for the town,” she said, noting she sees a lot of posts on Facebook when an ambulance is not available in town, either because one is out of service or out of town.
“I think this is going to be a tremendous impact for … our residents on the whole, so I want to thank the chief and everyone who’s had a part and parcel on getting the funds,” she said. “I’m very disappointed because I was trying to find more ways to get more money, but unfortunately, we reached that cap. Fingers crossed that we get more money.”
Select Board Vice Chair Dan Salvucci lauded the commissioner’s work.
“You know your county,” he said. “You know the state. You know who you need to contact and we just work so close together. Thank you.”
In other business, both Carter and Kowalski commented on an issue surrounding a letter from Sullivan-Almeida about Senate bill 2628: an Act Validating Results of the Town Election in Whitman of May 20, 2023.
Carter said bond counsel said the special legislation was needed to validate the election result to receive a “green light letter” which allows the town to proceed with borrowing for the DPW building.
Her April 2 letter sought to update the board on the legislation filed by Gov. Maura Healey on March 7 and referred to the Committee on Election Laws. On March 11 the committee began accepting written testimony and Sullivan-Almeida sent a letter of support asking for a favorable vote, which was achieved on March 28 and sent to the Joint Committee on House Steering and Policy Scheduling and on April 1 was reported by that committee for the matter to be placed on the orders of the day for the next sitting of the House of Representatives.
Sulivan-Almeida’s letter continued, saying that she is urging the bill’s passage.
“I would also like to correct the record regarding recent comments by some of the members of the Finance Committee, incorrectly claiming that I had incorrectly filed this bill,” she wrote. “The original legislation, Act 2516, was filed in the Senate by Sen. Brady and was not filed by me.”
She stressed that both she and Brady understood the request for a home rule petition could be filed by either of them and, when Brady did so, they both believed it was filed correctly.
It wasn’t until S2516 when the House was on its third reading of that bill, that Sullivan-Aleida was informed the governor would have to file the bill and that both the House and Senate had to vote on it. She quickly updated Brady and advised the town and, along with Brady, reached out to Gov. Healey’s office on getting the legislation filed.
The bill needed to be filed as a home rule amendment, not a home rule petition and for that reason had to be filed by the governor, instead, Carter said.
“The important thing is the governor actually filed 2628, I believe on the morning of the seventh of March,” Kowalski said. “That is the day after, on March 6 that our Finance Committee voted on sending a letter to the governor asking for action kind of suggesting that action was belated.”
Kowalski said the important consideration is that Sullivan-Almeida and Brady have worked diligently on this since they knew what had to happen.
“We have had unbelievable service from both our senator and our representative,” Kowalski said. “Rep. Sullivan-Almeida has been incredible in the way that she has given us information on a timely basis and pushing to get this done.”
Carter also said she was hopeful to see the issue conclude, noting she had sent the request after the project was approved by the Oct.30,2023 special Town Meeting and received additional funding for the DPW building. She sent a letter requesting the special Town Meeting to both Brady and Sullivan-Alemeida, including backup documentation.
Carter agreed that both legislators have been very helpful.

Within some 26 hours Monday and Tuesday, April 8 and 9, the School Committee certified a $62,930,345 compromise budget that includes some contract non-renewals, retirements, and $250,000 taken from excess and deficiency as well as using $100,000 in Circuit Breaker funds to close the budget gap. Then Whitman and Hanson officials then moved to fill the rest of the budget gap with override questions at town meetings and on the May annual town election ballots.
The two select boards met Tuesday, April 9, with Whitman Select Board planning to meet again today [April 11] on the matter. Voters in each community will take it from there next month.
The scenario was one of the budget-trimming proposals Superintendent of Schools Jeff Szymaniak had put before the School Committee last month.
“We’re not asking for an 11 percent increase here,” Chair Beth Stafford said in her board’s meeting on Monday, April 8. “The 11 percent is the assessment, not the budget increase.”
Stafford added that the assessment to towns increased because the state did not provide the district the increase that they should have.
“It was a very low increase – $100,000 doesn’t go very far, as you know,” she said.
The School Committee voted 9-0 to approve the compromise, which would increase the operating budget by 4.04 percent. David Forth was absent from the meeting.
“Instead of being well over $1 million for both towns, if we kept the assessment as it is, it would be down to about $509,212 for Whitman and [$372,141 for Hanson],” Stafford said. “In looking at their towns, [the officials] felt those would have a better chance at passing because it would be a smaller amount. … We know it’s a Band-Aid. I know the towns are thinking about larger overrides or doing something else, we can also look at other things we can do [in the future].”
Hanson’s override would ask the voters to support a $372,141 or 2.68 percent over the 5 percent that town’s officials had indicated was feasible, and Whitman’s override would be $509,212 or 3.87 percent over the 5-percent assessment increase town officials had planned for. The Hanson Select Board voted 4-1 – member Ed Heal was unable to attend because he was traveling – to place the article and ballot question but voted to refer the issue to Town Meeting rather than make a recommendation one way or the other.
“It’s their tax money,” Hanson Select Board Vice Chair Joe Weeks said. “I want them to figure out what is the best use of their tax money. I refuse to cut any operating jobs, positions or line items to fund this. … I don’t think we should be influencing them in any way.”
Hanson’s 7.68-percent assessment increase represents $14,974,736. Based on the average home assessed value of $470,190 in fiscal 2024, Whitman taxpayers would see an annual tax increase of $95.38, according to Carter.
Hanson taxpayer would see an annual increase of $94.98 annually based on an average home assessed value of about $499,000 in fiscal 2024 to fund the override there. Hanson has plotted out the tax impact for a range of home values on the town website, hanson-ma.gov.
The original assessment increase for Whitman had been 11.3 percent and Hanson’s had been close to 10.2 percent.
The Whitman Select Board, meeting the same night, heard Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter announce that the board would meet virtually at 12:30 p.m., today [Thursday, April 11] to vote on the question pertaining to the override article being placed on Whitman’s Town Meeting warrant and on the Town Election ballot. Whitman’s 7.787 percent assessment total is $19,135,687.
Whitman FinComm opposes move
The Whitman Finance Committee, also meeting Tuesday, unanimously voted not to support the school budget as Chair Rick Anderson termed it a lose-lose proposition for the schools.
“They came down a little over $900,000,” said Hanson Select Chair Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett during her board’s meeting Tuesday night. She repeated Szymaniak’s admonition that the budget would not negatively affect educational outcomes, but that they “needed to dig in in the interest of trying to meet everybody halfway.”
“It’s not our job to vote the assessment or even approve the assessment that is handed to us by the School Committee,” FitzGerald-Kemmett said. “But we do need to decide how we fund it, if voters want to do that. … This [budget scenario] was always on the table.”
She noted that the board had not wanted to make dire cuts to town personnel, so in order to do that, they have been talking about an override that is specifically for the schools, presenting it in the warrant as 5 percent being what the town can afford, and the budget for the schools would include an override.
“I don’t think anyone is leaving feeling victorious, but I do think it’s definitely better than it was a week ago.
Stafford outlined the meeting she and Superintendent of Schools Jeff Szymaniak had on Monday, April 1 with town administrators Mary Beth Carter of Whitman and Lisa Green of Hanson as well as select board chairs Laura FitzGerald Kemmett of Hanson and Dr. Carl Kowalski of Whitman.
“It was a good meeting,” Stafford said of the meeting with administrators and select board chairs. “It went about an hour and a half, almost. I do want to say they were not trying to micromanage us. They were not putting us down. They were understanding of what our concerns were, too.”
She said that she and Szymaniak felt the session was “very collaborative” and that the group tried to come up with something that would work, hopefully, but that such an outcome would depend on what the School Committee decided.
“I would like to remind the board, because some people have said we are going backwards, that we haven’t progressed, that we haven’t had any new progress,” Stafford said. “And I want to remind everybody that we certainly have. We’ve seen that in the last couple of months with all the data on the students’ progress alone. We’ve advanced, we’ve come forward.”
Stafford also emphasized that the district has, in fact come forward with new programs, such as Innovation Pathways to prepare students for the outside world in the medical and health as well as business fields. The district has also added curriculum for grades one through 10.
“What I’m going to suggest does not impact any student growth and it, hopefully, might be the best way of getting through this year,” Stafford said. “We have talked with them about more conversations forward with the town, too, and things that they have decided that they need to do, but we all know is that one of the main problems is the state.”
The district received “a little over $100,000” from the state for fiscal 2025, Stafford said, adding that representatives in the General Court must do more. She also reminded the public that the district is like it’s own municipality, with it’s own health insurance, maintenance and facilities costs – as any community does.
“We knew both sides couldn’t do much of anything without an override,” she said. “The issue was, if we’re going to do an override – what size?”
Budget impact on learning
“This was a level-service budget,” Stafford said. “This did not include anything else.”
Szymaniak had presented the different budget tiers and the assessment costs they carried last month. The tier voted on Monday was the first on that list, which gave back about $900,000 and calls for not filling non-renewals of some contracts and retirements.
“These positions would not affect student scores, would not affect the young students’ class sizes that everybody was so concerned about,” Stafford said. “It would be a loss of positions, but positions that Jeff felt could be absorbed.”
Stafford also alluded to questions from the public on whether the interventionists hired to help students transition back to classrooms after the isolation and remote learning during the COVID pandemic were necessary.
“I think that everybody could see that the interventionists made a difference,” she said. “All our scores went up and they continue to go up. That would put us backwards if we couldn’t have them anymore.”
Residents have also questioned recent hires.
Seven of the positions recently filled by the school district are now required by the state, including English Language Learners (ELL) teachers or tutors and the district also has to retain E&D and Circuit Breaker funds for midyear special education student enrollments or placements.
School Committee Vice Chair Christopher Scriven said Monday that he was interested in hearing what some of the discussions held during the meeting with town officials on April 1 about the future.
“How does this not put us right back in the same position next year?” he asked. “I’m curious to know what, if any, plans are in the works for the future?”
Stafford said Hanson Town Administrator Lisa Green has discussed her town’s consideration of a $5 million operational override next year as recommended by their Madden Report. While Carter has not specifically stated her town’s plan, there is also “discussion ongoing with them.”
Stafford also said she did not think a large override would pass this year and could cost upwards of 20 positions if it should fail.
“The real problem is coming from the state,” Scriven said. “We’re not doing anything to move forward here.”
He asked if there was any push back from the towns on whether the shortfall is due to anything other than a failure of the state to adequately fund schools and asked what the towns’ legislative team was doing to push the state to adequately fund schools, especially regional districts.
“If we look at the 5 percent assessment that the town’s kind of lock us into, we’re never going to get out of this with a .0001-percent increase from the state every year,” Szymaniak said. “We’re just not. It’s not going to happen.”
Whitman Select Board member Shawn Kain argued that, to say the state does not adequately fund schools is something of a misconception, however.
“Through their eyes, they’re giving us too much state aid, and they’ve given us too much state aid for the last period of time,” he said. “Once we come out of the hold-harmless situation, then we get back into the typical scenario and they start to fund us with state aid that’s proportional to our budget.”
Both Scriven and Fred Small acknowledged that the current budget practices are putting an undo burden on taxpayers, especially those on fixed incomes. Small again advocated for a five-year plan to better demonstrate the need to taxpayers.
Hillary Kniffen reminded the board they have already done that and agreed the problem is the state funding and a misunderstanding among local taxpayers that the schools are overspending.
Member Dawn Byers asserted there is more of a revenue collection problem on the part of the towns than a budgeting problem with the schools.
“To recognize the concerns about the taxpayers, we’re only doing them a further disservice by using E&D of $250,000,” she said. “Because when you go to borrow for a middle school building, that interest rate’s going to go up because the district has used E&D.”
She also said, while it’s comforting that education won’t be impacted, she is still concerned about what positions will be cut.
Stafford also said residents do not realize that $600,000 of the money taken out of E&D last year went toward helping the district recover from a damaging data breach the year before, on which recovery work is still being done. That was done so the amount not covered by insurance was not billed to the towns.
“We’re not unique,” said Committee member Glen DiGravio, attending remotely. “This is happening all over the state. Every town’s going to be voting on an override, pretty much… I think this is a fair compromise proposal. I think the motion before us is something that gets us through.”
He said he knows the Committee wants to fix next year and the next five years, but they have to fix this year first.
“If an override is going to happen, no matter what, I think making it as painless as possible is what we should be doing now,” he said, advocating Szymaniak’s proposal.
Hanson’s questions
In Hanson, Weeks asked a question many residents have been wondering about: What happens if the override fails?
Hanson Town Counsel Kate Feodoroff said if either town rejected the budget while the other approves it, that is considered a rejection and the School Committee may decide not to accept that, which would force another town meeting. If Hanson, for example, were to approve only the lesser amount and Whitman approves the greater amount, School Committee may opt to accept the lesser amount and adjust Whitman’s portion accordingly, Feodoroff said.
The Committee is, however, also able to force a Super Town Meeting, attended by residents, and would have to work within a 1/12 budget until it is settled.
FitzGerald-Kemmett summed up for her board that it seemed that, at the first budget certification vote in March, she felt the School Committee felt that, since the two towns were discussing an override, “We’re going for the gusto, we’re going to go for the maximum,” she said. “I’m not saying that for dramatic effect. I think their feeling was, ‘If they’re going to do an override anyway, and that’s how we’re going to fund this delta between the 5 percent and whatever we vote, then, let’s not cut back on anything and keep as much E&D and Circuit-Breaker money as we can.’ I am not defending this, nor am I trying to condemn them. I’m just stating this is the perspective.”
She also stressed that the School Committee is elected to do the job of advocating for students.
“We’re elected to do a different job,” she said. “That’s why, at budget time, it may feel like we’re at different ends of the spectrum, but they’re doing what they feel they need to do. … We’re trying to balance the town’s budget, and I don’t want to say never the twain shall meet, because I’m eternally hopeful that the twain shall meet at some point.”
FitzGerald-Kemmett also said the forensic audit is also continuing, with a meeting planned for this month perhaps as early as this week.

HANSON – Town and school district officials have been talking, and – while the school budget gulf has not yet been bridged – there is a clearer focus on the budget picture.
As the Select Board reviewed the warrant on Tuesday, April 2, Chair Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett sounded a note of cautious optimism that the gap could be bridged, or an override to span that difference would be needed. Last week the frustration over the school budget was strong [see stroy below].
Vice Chair Joe Weeks, during the warrant articles review, suggested the board not vote on recommending non-financial articles until next week.
“Does it make sense to put off this conversation until we actually know how much money we’re going to have?” he said. “Wouldn’t this conversation be better to have next week once FinCom has gone through their recommendations?”
They proceeded through the review voting only to place several financial articles until the Tuesday, April 9 meeting.
Select Board Chair Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett, noting that “diplomacy is not my forte,” described the meeting she attended with Superintendent of Schools Jeff Szymaniak, School Committee Chair Beth Stafford and Whitman Select Board Chair Dr. Carl Kowalski on Monday, April 1.
“We may be having additional conversations about the school assessment and where that is by next week, which potentially could be at a different place than it is right now,” she said.
Weeks said without a firm number on several articles, “a lot of this is guessing.”
FitzGerald-Kemmett said the board could either place and recommend non-monetary articles, place everything and remove any articles, not supported before the warrant closes. The board did, however, vote to place and recommend an article that increases zoning fines to give them more bite.
The board opted to place everything that had no monetary effect. It was in keeping with a caution sounded by Finance Committee Chair Kevin Sullivan.
“I imagine we’ll be preparing for the worst and stripping a lot of things that we’d like to do out of the articles,” Sullivan said as his committee prepared to review the warrant. “We will not be recommending a large majority of things we can put off.”
FitzGerald-Kemmett asked if the lens they might be looking through is different if the school assessment were to come down or did Sullivan still feel it would be problematic.
“I think we need a safety net, always, so I still think there are things we’re going to not recommend in the articles as well as we’re still going to make cuts to the budget,” Sullivan said. “Not enough to overcome the deficit, but enough to trim things out of the current budget that are ‘nice to haves.’”
The board voted to place the article but has not yet voted on whether to recommend it.
Balancing the budget, on paper, will take using $858,000 in free cash and keeping the schools at a 5-percent increase Kinsherf said. There would be $248,000 left in free cash if that scenario proves accurate.
“We can balance the budget as we currently have it,” he said. “The thought was that next [thing] we’d be thinking of is an override above the 5 percent that the schools want.”
“We’re not going to recommend paying more than 5 percent,” FitzGerald-Kemmett said. “We are at 5 percent. We are not moving beyond 5 percent.”
That said, she described the meeting with Whitman and school officials as having created an “understanding among everybody that, really, the towns are in a tough position” and can’t go above the 5 percent assessment increase without a school override.
“It would still be more of a partnership and much appreciated if the School Committee could take another look at the assessment that they’ve given to the towns and they have taken that under advisement and they will take it back to their School Committee,” she said. “It was a cordial conversation, everybody understood where everybody else was coming from [and] we basically said 5 percent is where it’s at.”
During that conversation, FitzGerald-Kemmett recalled that Szymaniak made a good point that “our 5 percent increase on their assessment really translates to a 3.8 percent increase” to the schools because the assessment is only a portion of the budget.
“Regardless of what we hear back from the School Committee, unless they say, ‘We’re going to go straight 5 percent, which I’m not anticipating is going to happen,” … we’re going to have a school override for the delta between the 5 percent and whatever the assessment is,” she said. “Whitman is doing the same thing.”
While she is hoping that the override is reduced and would go a long way toward helping people feel that at least some work has been done and “some ownership and mutual respect has been exhibited by everybody trying to work together on this.”
“It truly is a math problem,” she said. “Nobody was able to commit, I didn’t commit to anything, we just talked.”
Select Board member Ed Heal asked if they had to know how an override would look and if anything was being drafted.
Language for the article is preliminary according to Green who added it would be reorganized after the school district’s decision.
“Until a vote is taken by the School Committee, we ought not to be putting anything into our [warrant],” FitzGerald-Kemmett said. “I don’t think we should have a dollar amount at all in this. We know, if it’s anything in excess of 5 percent, whatever that dollar amount is will be in here.”
The choice is sticking to 5 percent or doing a school override for the delta between the two numbers, she said.
Schools are far from the only budget the Select Board is concerned about.
Town Administrator Lisa Green said the town also has, within the articles for the special Town Meeting Warrant, the ability to use ARPA funds for an $85,000 pond management study, for example, which could be tabled until October. The board agreed to delete that article from the May Town Meeting warrant.
Other financial
articles
The board also placed and recommended the Camp Kiwanee budget article, which largely shifts funds from retained earnings to the budget plan, according to Camp Kiwanee Commission Chair Frank Milisi. Town Accountant Eric Kinsherf echoed that by noting $50,000 would be transferred from receipts and the remainder from retained earnings.
“At the end of the day, we will have the side-by-side comparison of what the [Select Board] recommends and what FinCom recommended,” FitzGerald-Kemmett said.
The board had to cut the $15,000 article for an animal shelter renovation that was planned in addition to boosting the animal control officer to a full-time position. The board has discussed in depth earlier this year that the ACO has driven animals to the Lakeville shelter, which takes upwards of 40 minutes for a round-trip or brings animals, especially livestock, to his own property.
Weeks concerned about the potential liability of the ACO taking animals home.
“To me, I would like to see this handled as a project plan,” FitzGerald-Kemmett said. “I feel it needs flushing out.”
She tasked Green with doing more research to obtain solid numbers on the cost in light of Select Board member Ann Rein’s comment that she had toured Hanson’s shelter that day and determined it would likely cost much more than $15,000 to renovate.
“Bring it back in October with a little more meat on the bone,” she said.

WHITMAN – Zero raises, layoffs, closing departments, and using more free cash to balance the town budget could be the cost to Whitman of a failure to reach accord on a school budget, according to Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter.
“As I really got into it, I didn’t think that I would have to hit every single one of those to reach the number,” she said. “I had to decimate the budget and the only reason is because of the difference the School [Committee] certified from 5 to 11 percent. Call it what you want, but had they come in at 5 percent I would not be suggesting an override this year.”
She told the Select Board on Tuesday, March 26 that everything is on the table as the town seeks to balance the budget following the School Committee’s vote to certify a $63.5 million level-service budget last week. The Select Board has to vote on whether to place an override on the Town Election ballot at its next meeting, Tuesday, April 9.
“These reductions in the budget are drastic and debilitating to the town if an override is not put forth at the May annual Town Meeting,” Carter said during a joint meeting between the Select Board and the Finance Committee on Tuesday, March 26, as she listed the cuts she had to make as she worked all weekend to balance the fiscal 2025 budget.
“We’re here to listen,” said Finance Chair Rick Anderson, who said his committee had completed its meetings with budget managers of all departments and had scheduled meetings with town boards that night. “I know Mary Beth and [Assistant Town Administrator] Kathy [Keefe] are working very diligently on a challenging budget.”
Carter began by emphasizing her connection and commitment to Whitman schools – and that of her family, from her six siblings to her three children and three grandchildren, who “are or will be attending schools in the district.”
“Four of my siblings have spent their careers in education and administrators at the grade school level, the middle school level and the high school level,” she said. “I’ve always been pro-schools and pro-education, so for anyone to think otherwise, they would be mistaken.”
She said, however, that she is “disheartened” because the efforts of her office to hold meetings between the town and the school district earlier than in past years, failed to have a more positive and collaborative certified operational assessment for Whitman.
“I am only speaking for myself and not for the [Select Board], when I say that I feel that this year and every year going forward, that the district should certify their budget understanding that any amount that the district certifies each year over 5 percent, will need to be placed on an annual Town Meeting warrant as an override article and a subsequent ballot question at the annual Town Election for an operational override for the schools,” she said. “It would simplify the budget process each year for everyone.”
She added it would leave the question of increasing funding for the district up to the voters.
“The town has worked very hard to reduce all department budget requests for fiscal 2025 to ensure that an operational override is not put forth to our taxpayers his year,” Carter said. “I feel that there is, however, some light at the end of the tunnel.”
That light takes the form of an unfunded pension liability the town has been funding through Plymouth County Retirement, expected to be retired in 2029. The expected new annual amount will be “significantly lower than the assessments currently budgeted,” she explained.
In fiscal 2025, however, that assessment is $3,208,051. But by fiscal 2030, Carter hopes $1.5 million of $2.5 million saved will be put toward Whitman’s OPEB liability, allowing the remainder to be used to fund town departments.
But for this year, she painted a bleaker picture.
While the School Committee is charged with putting forth a budget for the district, I am charged with putting forth a budget for the [Select Board] that is balanced and meets the needs of all departments,” she said. That charge takes the shape of two warrant articles for the May Town Meeting.
The budget certified by the School Committee on March 20 with an assessment increase of 11.03 percent to Whitman, Carter said she has been tasked to present a dual budget to Town Meeting – the 5 percent projected increase the town anticipated as a school assessment as a “TA budget” and an 11.03 percent assessment increase offered as an “alternate budget,” reflecting the budget certified by the School Committee.
The alternate budget reflects the “potential impacts and reductions necessary if the district’s certified budget increase is put forth without an override,” Carter said, providing a stark breakdown of what that might mean.
Those cuts would mean “all non-union employee raises were eliminated for fiscal 2025, we laid off the following positions: three police officers, three firefighters, one DPW employee, one employee in the clerk’s office, one employee in the treasurer-collector’s office, one employee in the assessor’s office, two part-time [Council on Aging] employees, our technology specialist, we’ve also added in closing the library,” Carter said. “We also included in that budget, shutting down the Recreation Department.”
Three other full-time town employees would see their jobs cut to part-time hours.
Closing the library would also carry the financial sting of lost state aid as the town would lose its library certification and would need to operate for a full year on reopening in compliance before being certified again. Whitman is expected to receive $40,817 in library state aid for fiscal 2024.
Chair Dr. Carl Kowalski echoed Carter’s connection to the schools.
“I’ve always been a schools guy, also,” he said. “I’m as concerned as she is about what’s going on this year.” A 14-year past member of the School Committee, Kowalski said a sister and his son had also served on the School Committee.
“We are school people and this is a painful year that we’re looking at right now,” he said.
Select Board member Justin Evans commended Carter’s work, noting she had been working all weekend on the budget.
“To balance a budget in just a couple of days …” he said.
Anderson deferred to Kathleen Ottina for the Finance Committee’s position, noting that she has done a lot of work reviewing the school budget.
“There is money to be found in this school budget that does not affect the quality of education for children,” she said, emphasizing that some examples of non-sustainable small class sizes could be adjusted while leaving the ESSER positions alone.
Ottina expressed dismay that an email she sent to school officials with recommendations on non-mandated busing had, so far, gone unanswered. In the letter she identified two items where costs could be trimmed, one of them being non-mandated busing, citing her service for the past two years as a non-voting member of the Regional Agreement Committee.
“My one goal was to have the transportation language in the RA amended to reflect working that would more fairly assess Whitman for non-mandated busing,” she said. “Right now, the School Committee has the ability to just vote busing – mandated or non-mandated – and split it 60-40.”
They could also split it out and bill the towns for their non-mandated busing costs. The current configuration costs Whitman at least $40,000 – or $80,000 in fiscal 2025.
She said that, while considering herself a school advocate, she was disheartened by last Wednesday’s certification vote.
“They didn’t touch a penny,” Ottina said. “They didn’t touch a single item, knowing that both towns are in trouble.”
She likened it almost to a game of “chicken” to see which side blinks first.
“I don’t think we can call for a school override,” she said. “It’s not within our purview. … It’s time to call someone’s bluff.”
She said she could not support the budget as presented by the School Committee.
“They have some work to do,” Ottina said. “If we go to Town Meeting prepared to defend the budgets that our town departments need, and they haven’t made any work to get to the table and negotiate, then I don’t know what happens. … It’s a disaster.”
Select Board member Shawn Kain said it is a difficult conversation.
“Honestly, I think communities are judged by how well they have difficult conversations,” he said. “We’re talking numbers and accounting, but behind those numbers are people.”
His viewpoint was that the School Committee was saying if an override is needed, why not seek a level-service override. He didn’t see it as a way to get a budget passed at the expense of the towns.
“If we just clearly discuss our perspective and lay out what we’re trying to do, it’s a reasonable plan and I’m hoping they get on board with that,” Kain said.
Carter said the only reason she feels an operational override would be needed this year is because of the difference in the 5 percent operating assessment and the 11.03 percent put forward.
“I did what the schools did as well,” she said. “I took everybody who would be laid off or had their positions reduced and I added in [$400,000 in] unemployment costs.”
Carter also asked what departments could do to increase fees. The Fire Department is raising ALS 1 fees, the treasuer/collector is increasing demand fees to $25 from $25, she also asked the Select Board office and Police Department to increase fees as well.

School Committee on Wednesday, March 13 were meeting to figure out the impacts of financial challenges to the budget exactly four years after the district had to shut down – initially for only two weeks – in 2019 at the beginning the COVID-19 pandemic – a fact pointed to by Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak as that pandemic’s effects are still being felt.
“It was Friday, the 13th, the day before we were supposed to go to the state championship basketball game for the first time ever,” he recalled. “I was on a call with Commissioner Riley of DESE, who was explaining what was happening in terms of COVID [then referred to mainly as the coronavirus].”
At the time, Riley explained that school closings were a local decision/superintendent decision. He then had a conference call with about 25 superintendents from area school districts, who decided to unilaterally close school for two weeks.
“If you remember, then-Gov. Charlie Baker got on the news on Sunday and shut down the commonwealth for three weeks, which then became the rest of the school year,” Szymaniak said. “Since that shutdown and subsequent reopening, the district has employed many measures to deter any learning loss that happened to occur during that period of shutdown and then hybrid learning.”
Szymaniak prefaced his remarks by commenting that, while he does not usually make statements about the budget, he felt the need to do so.
“I want to kind of redefine the narrative and maybe clarify some facts that have been said publicly, and in print, about our district and out finances,” he said. “I’m really proud of where we’re at right now.”
Budget decisions facing the School Committee now include whether to cut staff and how many.
“If we have to cut, we have to cut,” Szymaniak said after outlining the ways the budget would need to be reduced. “I understand that. This is what we’re looking at. The budget that was presented to the committee as far as operations and facilities, we trimmed – we’re not even looking at a 3-percent increase in those line items.”
The Whitman budget earmarked the schools at a 5-percent assessment and Hanson put us where we asked for in the original 5-percent increase overall – closer to a 10-percent increase to their assessment.
The School Committee must decide on the assessments by March 20.
“These are not givens,” he said. “These are not endorsements from the superintendent… but these are realities of where we’re at.”
The district has $760,000 in excess and deficiency this year and, if needed, Szymaniak suggested $250,00 could be used to help close the deficit. Of the additional $720,000 in circuit-breaker, he suggested they take $100,000 from there. Both leave a comfortable amount in reserve in case additional special education are seen next year.
By not replacing non-renewables, retirements totaling a five-position cut another $560,000. Those reductions would reduce the deficit by $910,500. equaling a total increase to the district’s budget to 3.63 percent. The assessment to Whitman in such a scenario would be $7.87 percent and Hanson’s would be 7.68 percent.
“Below that line, and I won’t say I’m comfortable with these cuts, but these would increase some class sizes, especially at the younger grades,” he said noting that unemployment would also need to be calculated where some cuts are concerned.
“We’d be pink-slipping and laying off,” he said. As of April 1, if staff members on long-term leave do not return, the district could see a potential savings of another $100,000.
“But I can’t anticipate or count on that,” he said. By making cuts of about five positions below that could save $350,000, meaning a 3 percent overall budget increase, or a 6.64 percent assessment for Whitman and a 6.69 percent increase to Hanson – total cuts of $1,260,500 or a 5.16 assessment increase to Whitman and 5.51 percent to Hanson. That would cut – with circuit-breaker and excess and deficiency cuts – to $1,696,500.
“We have to go lower because the two towns are giving us are closer to the 5’s, we’d have to look at an additional six staff members,” Szymaniak said for a total of $426,000 or a 2.3 percent increase of the total budget.
To get to the 5.1 percent would take 16 professional position staff cuts, especially in the upper grades, calling for cuts in grade three, four and five teaching positions and bringing class sizes closer to 25.
“We wouldn’t cut any interventionists, they might bump, but that position is needed for [compliance with] the law,” Szymaniak said. “We wouldn’t touch EL staff and special education staff as we need to legally support those students. This is not what I’m asking the Committee to do tonight, but I wanted to foreshadow what is out there.”
Chair Beth Stafford said special ed paraprofessionals and teachers must also be hired for preschool students in need of those services to comply with the law.
“That increases our budget,” she said. “We can’t play with those things and people have to understand that.”
Szymaniak said academics and academic achievement are not always a subject of discussion at School Committee meetings, but he stressed they are seeing gains they haven’t seen before because it is their job.
“We’re supposed to educate kids,” he said. “We do a lot of other stuff. We talk about buses. We talk about safety. All these things are very important, but the bottom line is moms and dads and caregivers send their kids pre-school to [age] 22 for an education.”
While the COVID pandemic was very difficult, because of the stimulus funds they were able to receive and put to good use, they are at the place where academic gains are being seen.
He reminded the Committee and public that the federal government had supplied three different grants: Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) grants I, II and III to support school districts nationwide and support students.
Szymaniak pointed to ESSER funds as a target of criticism.
“There has been talk that ESSER money has been spent on positions that are no longer needed,” he said. “I disagree.”
He stressed that without ESSER funds, the district would have to make difficult decisions to cut positions in past fiscal years to comply with the law and support all students.
“ESSER funds were a tremendous asset to the W-H Regional School District and, in my opinion, we used these funds to put our students and the district in a better position than we were pre-COVID,” Szymaniak said. “However, this committee has reminded me multiple times of the fiscal cliff and the end of ESSER in September 2024.”
Today, the district is, in effect, about $850,000 short in the budget because of this cliff and $500,000 short because we used excess and deficiency [funds] last spring … which correlates to the additional staff we hired during these difficult years and to be compliant with the law.”
He added, however, that during the COVID years, the district also needed to add additional staff to confront another challenge – supporting the growing number of English Language learners who had moved into the school district.
School districts are required by law to hire staff to assist such children.
In 2021, W-H employed 3.5 English Language Learner staff and, by the 2024-25 school year it will have employed 11.
The 2015 Every Student Succeed Act, (ESSA) also found the district deficient by not supplying a multi-teired system of support for all it’s students.
Assistant Superintendent George Ferro and Director of Equity and MTSS Dr. Nicole Semas-Schneeweis had presented a review of the district’s success in helping all students during their report on its midyear assessment data [See related story.]
“Because of our commitment to the interventions and to the interventionists hired to ensure [a multi-tiered support system], our students have not only not regressed, as anticipated, but are progressing better than this district has ever seen,” Szymaniak said.
The district also has “admirable” class sizes in the all grades as a result of the Committee’s commitment to the district and past budgets presented.
“Our students are making academic gains and have their social-emotional needs met because of the prior year’s fiscal commitment made by this Committee,” he said. “I understand that we may need to eliminate or cut positions because the ask of a 5.3 percent overall increase [emphasis his] to the budget is too high for both these towns. I also understand that because we only see a $30 per-pupil increase in Chapter 70 revenue, which equals to $106,000, means that the towns of Whitman and Hanson are asked to absorb the difference, year after year, in our budget difference.”
By relying on the hope that $100,000 from the state each year will lead to imminent cuts in the future, is a “detailed topic for another meeting.”
Szymaniak suggested residents research what their towns spend on education – including vocational education.

WHITMAN – The town should have a clearer picture of the budget situation by the time it meets to review the fiscal 2025 town budget on Tuesday, March 26.
Chair Dr. Carl Kowalski, in this regular report to the board on Tuesday, March 12, thanked Whitman resident and former Finance Committee member John Galvin, Finance Committee member Kathleen Ottina and Select Board member Shawn Kain for “keeping the possibility of an override in the public eye.”
Galvin and Ottina submitted columns to the Whitman-Hanson Express last week, and Kain has submitted one for publication in this week’s issue [see page 7].
“I’d also like to thank Beth Stafford, the chair of the School Committee, for reminding us that the school’s final assessment has not been made yet,” Kowalski said. “But they will probably be making it … at their March 20 meeting. Good timing, because we will be meeting with the Finance Committee in our joint meeting on [Tuesday], March 26
“I’d just like to thank all these people for keeping these kind of tricky budget matters on people’s minds,” he said. “It’s important for us to be thinking about it.”
Assistant Town Administrator Kathleen Keefe said the municipal budget is a “work in progress.”
Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter is still working on the fiscal budget, “putting in long and hard hours on that, but I believe the next week will reveal some information that will be key.”
During the meeting, the Select Board also voted to advance the draft of the MBTA Communities community zoning amendment to the Planning Board.
A representative of the Planning Board attended the meeting to determine how the Select Board voted, to take it downstairs to his board, and plan a public hearing. The Planning Board put forth a proposed zoning amendment to be voted by the Select Board on Tuesday for that public hearing to be scheduled. Legal counsel has not completed their review of the amendment as the lawyer doing that is recovering from a recent medical procedure.
“She expects to have her review finalized prior to the public hearing, which the Planning Board plans to schedule on April 8,” Keefe said. “Town Counsel did suggest that [the] Select Board recommend putting this forth to the Planning Board, pending the final review of Town Counsel.”
It will come back to the Select Board for a final vote on April 9, which will be after the April 8 public meeting.
“It’s a tight schedule,” Keefe said. “Publications have to be posted in the newspaper – it’s a really tight deadline – which is why we’re hoping the board considers it tonight.”
Something to
celebrate
With the town of Whitman poised to celebrate its 150th anniversary in 2025, the Select Board voted to endorse appointing Richard Rosen to chair the anniversary committee. Rosen has met with Carter about the appointment since he organized the last anniversary celebration of 125 years in 2000.
“Mr. Rosen expressed an interest in organizing the 150th anniversary celebration,” Keefe said. “He’s already contacted several people who were involved in that last anniversary celebration. He already has several great ideas for the coming event, and we just want to thank Mr. Rosen for offering to organize this very important celebration.”
Vice Chair Dan Salvucci noted that Rosen had organized Whitman’s past WinterFest celebration for 20 years and “has all the connections and the volunteers.”
“I think it will be a great event.” he said.
In other business, Kowalski lauded the W-H Will program that continues to meet at WHRHS.
Noting that he had not been able to attend the meetings for a while, Kowalski said the Tuesday, March 12 morning session was an “enlightening experience,” with nine students as well as school counselors, Superintendent of Schools Jeff Szymaniak and Whitman and Hanson police and fire officials.
“Listening to the students talk, plainly and intelligently and smoothly about their activities as far as SADD is concerned, as far as mentors for their classmates who are having issues with substances or anxiety … was an uplifting couple of hours,” he said, encouraging members of the Select Board to attend as well from time to time. He also encouraged parents to attend, noting Whitman parents do not participate as much as those in some other communities do.
“I reminded myself how important that group is and how much you learn when you go,” he said.

HANOVER – During a joint meeting of the South Shore School and Building committees on Thursday, Feb. 22 the Building panel voted 10-0, with one person – School Principal Sandra Baldner – absent, to design a new school for 900 students and to authorize the project team to submit a schematic design to the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) by Feb. 29.
Only the Building Committee is authorized to vote on the preferred design and enrollment for the new school. The entire School Committee happens to be member of the Building Committee and held a brief business meeting at the conclusion of school building matters.
Whitman member Dan Salvucci, who had been hesitant to vote for the larger building, said the other committee members had convinced him as he cast his yes vote.
Jen Carlson of LeftField said, in response to questions that the cost per square foot is higher for lower enrollments because the size specialized spaces like shops, the kitchen and gymnasium do not shrink much, if at all, just because an enrollment might be lower. The same is true for shared spaces such as library, cafeteria and multi-purpose auditorium and the more generic classroom spaces.
“An approximately 100-student design enrollment drop resulted in a 3-percent increase in the cost per square foot,” she said of an 805-student [$920.66 per square foot] vs. a 900-student [$880.72 per square foot] school. The same type of increases were evident in schools with lower enrollment capacity, which the committees had removed from consideration.
Construction and soft costs did increase with the higher enrollment figures being considered, however. The estimated total cost of an 805-student school would be $274 million with a a likely MSBA share of 36.34 percent, or $100 million, and a 900-student school is $283 million with a likely 37.89 MSBA share, or $107 million, according to Carlson. Districts would be responsible for 63.66 percent, or $174 million, on an 805-student school and 62.11 percent, or $176 million, on a 900-student school.
“These numbers will change, they’re for comparison purposes only,” Carlson reminded the committees. “The MSBA participates more with higher enrollment, at least in this instance, where they’ll participate a little less with the lower enrollment in this case.”
Whitman Finance Committee member Rosemary Connolly told the committees that, the MSBA share for Whitman’s last building was close to 60 percent of eligible costs.
“Considering that we will be paying 25 percent of this [project’s] cost and we exceed allotted amounts by double the students, I would like you to question is there a tipping point where a town would pull out if they’re going to end up paying double the amount they would to build it outside the reimbursement” Connolly said. “You have to consider, when you’re talking about pushing these numbers so high, when will a town say, we’re going to pull out?” she said.
Superintendent/Director Dr. Thomas J. Hickey said that Connolly had raised similar questions a December public forum on the project in Whitman.
“We are in the process of communicating, and have actually initiated, outreach to MSBA to address the first issue, that Rosemary raised,” he said.
Based on the way the enabling legislation for MSBA reads, he is asking how a reimbursement rate is calculated with a regional school district and when an independent agriculture and/or technical school is under consideration.
“The MSBA, in my opinion, should look at which ZIP Codes are sending kids to the school, and that merely taking every ZIP Code that is a part of our regional district and treating them as if they sent equal numbers of kids, is what could potentially contribute to a lower reimbursement rate,” Hickey said. “That is a conversation that is still on the radar. A few percentage-point adjustments could make a big difference for everybody, there’s no question about it.”
Hickey said vocational schools are reimbursed at the same rate as regular high schools and the cost per square-foot caps are the same, regardless of the specialized spaces vocational schools use for shop instruction.
“We’ve been advocating, as a community, for a long time collectively to ask that the MSBA create a separate lane [for vocational schools],” he said. “Whatever they can do at the state level, provides relief at the local level.”
At the very least, Hickey would like them to consider the current funding formula.
If they interpret the enabling legislation to allow them to consider where students come from and the relative wealth of those communities at the time they secure a project funding agreement with SST, that could also change reimbursement numbers, which could change the bottom-line numbers, he said.
“It is not lost on me that the pace at which we can admit students cannot go any faster than the ability of our towns to pay for an operating budget,” Hickey said. Project timing and district expansion are other considerations, but the best revenue source is the MSBA reimbursement, he stressed.
Architect Carl Franchesci of DRA also emphasized that the estimated MSBA shares being discussed are not the district’s reimbursement rate.
“Your reimbursement rate is more like 50-something percent,” he said. “It’s going to be the effective rate, after you eliminate those ineligible costs.”
Both Carlson and Hickey said it was just over 55 percent for the feasibility phase.
“That ties into what I said about so many costs for vocational schools are not reimbursable, so it drags the number down,” Hickey said. “Even if we did clock in at the mid-50s for construction-eligible reimbursement, the conversation with MSBA still has to happen.”
Salvucci, a member of both the School and Building committees, said any out-of-district students the school would be able to accept would be charged at a rate set by the state and those funds could be used to offset construction costs a bit.
At the moment, there are about 80 students on a waiting list to attend SST.
“There’s a construction conversation, then there’s capacity, and finding that sweet spot between the ability to enroll and have the staff on an operating level, be able to serve kids,” Hickey said. “It seems as though, unlike a lot of schools that might have waiting lists, but every other community around them is already aligned with another school, there’s the potential for expansion, there’s the potential to open to non-resident enrollment, if necessary.”
Some of those concerns could be reconciled by a gradual pay as-you-go-model and/or an amendment to the regional agreement by the fall, he said. But, right now, the number of unused seats is being offset by an increase in applications from member towns like Whitman.
There is also interest from Pembroke in joining the district, as Marshfield is already doing.
“If Pembroke were entering the district this fall, they’d be at about 11 percent of the district, which is about an average number,” Hickey said. “Norwell’s number was very high in the 1970s.”
Norwell representative Dustin Reardon said his town was 40 percent of the enrollment at that time. Scituate meanwhile, with 54 students attending next year will be the highest enrollment for that town since 1982.
“There’s no telling when it’s a trend and when it’s a blip, but in the long term, we have considerable construction costs, a long-term investment and the opportunity to expand the region to help pay these costs – and those operating costs,” Hickey said. “When talking to the residents of our district, we have to start with the facts … Pembroke has nothing to do with MSBA, quite honestly.”
Salvucci said it seems that vocational school enrollment is increasing generally.
“I think the trend is they are increasing, obviously, and waiting lists certainly vary,” Hickey said. “Regionalized vocational education is not cheap, but it’s the least-worst option, in terms of being able to give kids from small towns access to 12 or 14 vocational programs.”

WHITMAN – The Select Board has begun the discussion surrounding a possible override question to put before voters this May.
“As you know, we have put a 5 percent increase as a place-holder in the fiscal 2025 budget for the W-H Regional School District assessment,” said Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter. “If the district certifies an amount greater than the 5 percent we have planned for, the board may want to consider a Proposition 2 ½ override for any amount requested in excess of the 5 percent.”
She said such a move would require an additional warrant article for the annual Town Meeting and a ballot question for the May 18 annual Town Election. The Board will again discuss the budget issue on March12. The School Committee has until March 16 to certify its budget.
“I suggest that we consider this course of action and plan to include the related agenda items on an upcoming Board of Selectmen’s agenda in March to further discuss this issue,” she said.
Board member Shawn Kain, who is on the budget subcommittee, also spoke to the potential need for an override.
“The School Committee is in a tough spot,” he said, “There’s a good group of people who are trying to do best by kids, and at the same time wrestle with this budget, and they definitely are in a dilemma.”
He noted enrollment dropped again, the district is still in the hold-harmless situation, they spread themselves a bit thin with the use of one-time money as the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief fund (ESSER) money is going away and the state is pulling back on some funding. The ESSER funds were used to fund a number of positions to help students recover educational ground after remote learning during COVID.
Hold-harmless is a process by which the state calculates how much state funding was provided in a previous year, plus a small per-pupil addition to arrive at how much they believe a district will need and provide the larger dollar amount. A district is “held harmless” by not reducing your aid. If the state believes that need is declining, usually because of declining enrollment, all the budget growth is borne by the towns.
“They’re certainly in a difficult situation and, honestly, the solution isn’t clear,” Kain said. “Hopefully, we can go through the budget and find some ways to save money. I’m sure that would be greatly appreciated by the community. But with the signs of a deficit for a level-service budget, it’s understandable that they would consider an override and I think they should have the opportunity to do so.”
Kain added that he, personally, would like to see an enrollment projection to see exactly what the school district is facing.
“There is a difference between a stable enrollment override and an override that takes place while enrollment continues to drop,” he said. “If enrollment continues to drop – and I don’t know that that’s the case – but were it to continue to drop, then it’s no guarantee, but we would likely, or more likely, still be in the hold-harmless situation, which would complicate things moving forward.”
He said on the town side, although it would place a significant strain on departments, it may be advantageous to “limp through the next couple years” because of the Plymouth County retirement liability continuing strain that side of the budget. Those increases, to makeup a deficit in that fund are forecast to continue for the next three or four years.
“After that time, we know there’s going to be a significant drop-off,” he said. “Now that we know that and we can kind of project out what that’s going to do, for the town side, it may be advantageous, on Mary Beth’s recommendation, that we stay kind of disciplined, as opposed to combining with the schools for an override. But that’s something to talk about and consider.”
For now, he said, the recommendation is to discuss a school override.
Chair Dr. Carl Kowalski said the only wrinkle he sees is that it would be a Select Board proposal to put it before the voters.
Kain asked that the board consider whether they wanted to discuss the issue with department heads to determine whether the town wanted to “piggy back” an override in addition to the schools or follow Carter’s recommendation, which he favors.
“I think I agree with Mary Beth, that’s the way to go,” Kowalski said. “The difference between the 5 percent and what the schools initially said they needed for a level-service budget is a great difference. It seems to me that it needs the consideration of an override in order to have it work.”
Kowalski said the Select Board should propose putting that before the voters as a ballot question.
Select Board member Justin Evans expressed concern that, at the board’s last meeting, they discussed that town departments might consider it.
“Town departments are also not living within the Madden recommendations,” he said. “Over the last couple of years, as well as this year, their projected increases are greater than what we can afford for any given department.”
Unless there have been voluntary efforts to make cuts, that’s probably still the case, he said it would be difficult to say it’s an override driven by the need of the schools.
“For this to work, Hanson would also need to pass an override just for the schools, otherwise we’re passing an override that can’t be spent, I don’t think,” he said.
Kain said that is why discussing it early and making it public sets the tone.
“If we do this, we’re sending a clear message as to what our intentions are,” he said.
Carter said the Plymouth County retirement liability is set to end in 2029 if the retirement board does not vote to extend it.
“That’s light at the end of the tunnel, but it is a few years down the road,” she said.
She met with department heads on Thursday, Feb. 15 and asked for their suggestions for cuts and, if she didn’t hear back from them she would go through it as best she could to reduce it.
By the next scheduled Select Board meeting on March 12, she said the School Committee would be meeting to certify their budget.
Finance Board members Kathleen Ottina and Rosemary Connolly, each attending the Select Board meeting to address other matters, said they appreciate to difficulty, but had questions.
“As a FinCom member, I know the gap,” she said. “I question the legality of forcing an override on the schools. … Towns can’t cut the school budget. They can either accept it or not accept it. … I question the legality of what the town is suggesting, that the school budget can be segregated into what the town is capable of funding within the 5 percent and then the rest would be put on an override.”
Kowalski and Carter said it was considered legal in 2016 when the same course of action was taken. Carter stressed that town counsel would be asked to examine it this year, as well. Ottina countered that the initiative came from the schools in 2016.
“To be clear, this would be with the cooperation of the schools,” Kain said. “If the schools were not in agreement with this structure, then we would have to pivot.”
“Schools have autonomy over their budget,” Connolly said. “There are so many laws and requirement that they have to meet. It’s one of the reasons you’re supposed to put your school budget first.”
She asked what happens if the schools put forward a budget that meets students needs, but still does not meet what the Select Board wants.
“Do you have a secondary budget set, because it’s going to come out of all of your other budgets?” she asked. “I just feel like this might be a little bit dangerous and almost theatrical and not really proper budgeting.”
Evans agreed the schools have autonomy, but they also have to present their budget to be printed in the warrant, but the Select Board also has to present a balanced budget to Town Meeting.
“That’s a huge point that Mr. Evans just made,” said resident John Galvin, who has served on the Finance Committee in the past. He noted that to keep to the 5 percent the towns indicated they could afford in a school budget, $1.9 million in cuts would be necessary to the school budget.
If you look at what’s causing this deficit, it’s clearly a revenue issue with the schools,” Galvin said. “It’s not just the $800,000 worth of ESSER, or the $500,000 worth of [excess and deficiency] that could be used. They’re also being told from the state … and federal other grants to be short almost another $400,000.”
State Cherry Sheet numbers will be down almost $125,000, he noted.
“If you add those all up, it’s basically the $1.9 million deficit that the schools are saying they would have if the towns are funding at 5 percent assessment,” he said. “All the grants they’re forecasting in their revenue are gone.”
He asked how the town could even think about handling that without an override. The town’s budget increases, by comparison, were designed to help increase town services.
“They’re going to lose jobs,” Galvin said of the schools. “I can’t imagine why the schools wouldn’t want to work with us on this. It’s really the only way the schools have a chance.”
Connolly asked which school – between W-H and the four tech schools students attend.
Kowalski said the W-H district was being discussed.
Kain said increases from other regional schools, such as South Shore Tech and Norfolk Agricultural, are due to enrollment increases where the enrollment at W-H is decreasing.
Resident Robert Kimball of Auburnville Way, urged the Select Board to consider the elder population in town, who are already financially stressed because of ballot initiatives for a new DPW building and a new Whitman Middle School.
“It’s nice to have a level-service budget, but let’s make some cuts someplace,” he said. “Let them try to cut their budget. They’ve got decreased enrollment.”