Town Election: A Big ‘No’ On Override; School Committee Incumbents Swamped By Populist Pair

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Photo: Belmont Town Clerk Ellen Cushman announcing Town Election results.

In the biggest – and far reaching – decision of the 2021 Belmont Town Election, voters defeated a Proposition 2 1/2 override by approximately 1,000 votes, 4,539 to 3,526; a repudiation of the three year $6.4 million fiscal package targeted to fill the growing structural deficit that has been haunting the town’s finances for more than a decade.

Tuesday’s night results – read from the Town Hall steps by Town Clerk Ellen Cushman at 9:35 p.m., Tuesday, April 6 – was just one of a number of results suggesting the populous was seeking change in how governance is conducted in the Town of Homes.

Roughly 47 percent of voters cast ballots – a total of 8,271 voting – which is slightly less than the 51 percent (8,607 votes) which participated in 2015, the last time Belmont went to the polls to decide an override.

For unofficial results, head over to the Town Clerk’s webpage and the 2021 election.

“Voters have clearly decided not to go forward with this override now but the problems that we face as a town are not going to go away,” said Nicole Dorn, who chaired the ‘Yes for Bemont’ campaign.

“We are disappointed, but most of all we are concerned about the future of Belmont. As both our elected leaders and the professionals who oversee our budget have indicated: Belmont residents should expect a tough few years ahead,” said Dorn.

In the crowded field for Belmont School Committee, a pair of populists – Meghan Moriarty and Jamal Saeh – handily defeated the two current members, Tara Donner and Evelyn Gomez, and challenger Tim Flood.

Running on a platform that first surfaced on a local Facebook page where parents believe children were not being served by the actions of the Belmont School Department during a world-wide pandemic, education consultant Moriarty (3,838 votes) and pharmaceutical executive Saeh (3,989) struck a nerve with a portion of residents who felt aggrieved by a perceived lack of movement by the district and School Committee in opening schools full-time.

With their defeat Tuesday, the school committee loses its only active teacher in Donner (1,995 votes) and with Gomez (2,355), a champion of advancing racial and cultural diversity in her single year on the committee.

In another surprise, first-time candidate Adrienne Allen defeated incumbent Stephen Fiore, current chair of the Belmont Board of Health, by a margin of 117 votes, 3,067 to 2,950.

Another office holder, the venerable candidate Tomi Olson was defeated by veteran campaigner Anne Mahon by nearly 950 votes for a five-year seat on the Belmont Housing Authority.

And Mark Paolillo will be back on the Select Board for his fourth three year term after winning unopposed.

Town Meeting Results

Some surprises on the Town Meeting front as two long-time members in Precinct 6 – Joel Semuels and Robert Reardon – the chair of the Board of Assessors – lost the 12th seat to first-timer Marie Warner, head of Citizens for a Fiscally Responsible Belmont, who managed the “No” campaign against the override.

Over in Precinct 3, newcomer A. Ayodeji Baptista impressively topped the ballot with 463 votes.

There will be three Town Meeting members who will be joining the approximately 300 member group via write-in ballots from Precinct 7.

Letter To The Editor: Vote ‘Yes’ To Secure Our Shared Future

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To the editor:

I’m a Belmont parent who likes clear and simple. For me, Tuesday’s override ballot question can be reworded simply: Do you support funding smaller classes for students?

After a long, hard year, my son goes back to school in-person full time on Monday. Finally. He will have 23 students in his class, less than five percent of his teacher’s divided time. Without the override, smaller classes are impossible, there will be fewer teachers, and no math coaches. The past year has been hard, hard, hard. I’m exhausted by the slow pace of return-to-normal, and how it has affected us all. Yet the forward looking question remains: do we support smaller classes for all our students in 2021 and beyond? I say YES.

As a member of our connected community, the override could also be worded as: Do you support hiring a social worker for the senior center?

I say YES. Without the override, our seniors get even less support. I will be a senior one day in Belmont.

I’m hopeful for our future, and want to invest in our community. I like running our streets and trails, being outdoors, and the smell of grasses and pine trees on Lone Tree Hill. The override might be rewritten as: Do you support finding more green infrastructure opportunities in our town?

I say YES. Without the override, we will underinvest in sustainable infrastructure and our shared outcomes.

In running every street in Belmont, I’ve unblocked storm drains, tripped on too many sidewalks, and carried home the trash I found along the way. You might read the override as: Do you support hiring more DPW workers to help maintain our community? How about Police, and Fire?

I say YES. Without the override, we will fall farther behind in essential maintenance and public safety resources.

Many of those most affected have no choice, and no voice. Our school children cannot vote for smaller classes and more teacher time. Our non-US citizen neighbors cannot vote. We can choose. They are counting on us to invest in our shared future. Please vote YES with me on Tuesday.

Matt Taylor, Edgemoor Road

Opinion: Come Together Belmont, Right Now

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Photo: The cover of the Beatles album “Abbey Road”

By Mary Lewis

On April 5, Belmont’s elementary school children will have the opportunity to attend school in-person and full-time for the first time since March 12, 2020. Middle and high school students will follow later this spring. On May 3, Belmont Center will resume the outdoor dining it first launched due to COVID last year. And on June 23, the pool will reopen – albeit with some limitations on numbers. These are opportunities for us to come together, hopefully mostly vaccinated, as a community. There’s a lot to look forward to after an excruciatingly difficult year. I can’t wait to reconnect with people I’ve barely seen for months.

Here is what I don’t want to overhear at an outdoor table in the center or poolside: arguments about what sports should be cut from the middle and high schools, whether theater is more important than music or vice versa, and which days the library should cut hours, or why there is trash overflowing at Joey’s, Pequosette, and Grove Street Parks on the weekends. If this happens, it will mean that the override has not passed, and while other towns are busy bouncing back from a horrible year, we will be compounding our public health crisis with a fiscal one that further divides our town.

It doesn’t have to be that way. If we acknowledge that acting now saves taxpayers money. Belmont’s multi-year structural deficit will not magically disappear if we ignore it. In fact, it will just get bigger. And, as welcome as the news is of federal aid for our small businesses, renters, and others facing difficulty meeting housing costs, we must face the fact that regarding the other aid promised to the town, only a very small percentage will be unrestricted or not allocated for COVID-related expenses.   

If you put off painting your house because of sticker shock, you may have to replace rotting wood and paint your house – at much greater cost. We’re in the same situation with our town. Deferring maintenance and routine expenses makes things cost more, not less. Likewise, cutting first responders means paying overtime if those who are left are needed in an emergency. Failing to hire a procurement officer means we spend more, not less, on supplying our schools and town with the things they need to function, whether its road salt or school desks. Let’s not delude ourselves: as counterintuitive as it might seem, deferring a tax increase does not help our most vulnerable residents. It just makes our collective costs snowball, burdening us all more. Like a routine paint job before rot sets in, the override saves money in the long run.

This spring, let’s come together as a community again – finally – at school, in town center, at the pool, in our parks. And let’s come together as a community that assumes responsibility for maintaining and sustaining what we have before it falls apart.

Please join me in voting Yes on Question 1 on April 6.

Letter To The Editor: Demonstrate Your Anger And Dissatisfaction – Vote No On The Override

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Photo: Letter to the editor

Letter to the editor:

We are all stressed these days. We are working from home, learning from home, socialize online and managing many emotions. We transform every room in the house from dining room to classroom to board room and beyond. Everyone is tired and we yearn for how things used to be. 

But do we really want things to go back to “normal”? Regardless of how you interpret this question, I hope we do not return to how things used to be. If we have learned anything through this pandemic, how it used to be doesn’t work. Blindly throwing more money at a problem does not solve the problem.  

Since the day we closed schools down more than a year ago, our administration and school committee have failed our students and families. The School Committee was not and still is not up to the task at hand. Its primary role is to negotiate with the Belmont Education Association (BEA) which they have utterly failed to do over and over this year. 

Teachers must also take part of this blame. Although many teachers have worked hard to transition to remote learning, others have chosen politics, toed the line and committed a grave disservice to the students they are supposed to serve. Shame on them. 

Our families are left in dismay and frustrated; the ones who are able are running for the hills, searching for solutions outside the district in any way they can. Those remaining are engaged in arguments of spending more money because they do not see a better way forward, despite the negative impacts on many of our families that are barely making ends meet. We are a year into a pandemic, which is by no means near its end. Our parents and students are understandably dissatisfied and have a right to be upset, but where should this frustration be focused? The leadership, “lack of funding,” or should it be something else that is goes below the surface? 

I have run twice for town office in two years. Both times with the position of reducing our overall town spending. No one wants to run on a platform to reduce spending which is admittedly an uphill battle, but one I believe must be undertaken. Even those who are in favor of the proposed override, agree that we lack fiscal oversight and management in town. Everyone agrees that we spend more than our revenue. Everyone agrees the town deficit is an inherited from generations of the past.

What we cannot agree on is how we fix the problem. There are many ways we can come together to solve this problem. However, this ridiculous push to continuing to spend our way out of a deficit is not sustainable. This approach will never force change upon our leadership and will forever be a financial burden on families.

I agree with Jeff Liberty’s Letter to the Editor published in the Belmontonian on March 21. Everyone is exhausted with the same conversations and arguments every single election. What I do not agree with; however, is electing the same people again and again or replacing leaders with their cronies that prevent to town from moving forward to create meaningful change for the betterment of our town and our educational system.

I understand and agree someone like me who is outspoken and takes unpopular opinions can be a scary decision at the ballot box. After years of ineffective meetings, committees, communication, and lack of good decision making, it is time to demand change. It’s time to hold our current leaders and their mistakes accountable with your vote.  

Voting either yes or no for the override will have real consequences. Ask yourself: will your family, friends, and neighbors still be able to live here after you cast your vote? Will you be able to look them in the eye and tell them you voted yes or no? Will your vote truly create fiscal control? A no vote gives us a real opportunity for change. A yes vote ensures the status quo. 

The town argues that current services are unsustainable in the current environment. I disagree. We are delaying hard but inevitable choices, structural changes that must be made. These changes must be made despite the outcome of the vote. Our community relies on us, collectively, to work together for the greater good. We want great teachers – we have many – we want to support our seniors to age in place – some are – and we want to have inclusive community – we are definitely not there yet. 

Years of ineffective leadership and mismanagement have taken us to where we are today. This is a simple and undeniable fact, and one we talk about during every election cycle. We have historically underfunded our schools and town departments because of, not despite of, the mismanagement of funds, which has caused division within our community. 

Challenges can also bring a community together, and because of this I am hopeful. The challenges we face are clear and defined, and therefore resolvable. This will require trust in each other and accepting new ways of thinking.  

The conclusion should be simple. Vote no against the override on April 6. Demonstrate your anger and dissatisfaction with our town’s leaders. Show you want real accountability and demand a clear, actionable plan for our collective future. Show you want a School Committee that will strongly negotiate for all our children and get them back in school. Show you want Town Meeting members that will put your precincts interest before their own. Show the Select Board that fiscally responsibility is a priority. And show you matter; demand this now.  

Timothy Flood, Wiley Road, Candidate for School Committee

Letter To The Editor: A Yes Vote On Override Necessary So Students Receiving Special Education Services Can Succeed

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Photo:

To the editor:

At a November Parent Teachers Organization meeting, a Belmont Public School administrator explained one of the rationales for the “WIN” (What I Need) blocks in students’ schedules: they provide the time needed to work with students who receive special education services. That prompted a parent to respond that never before had it felt that a minority of students were holding all the others back. The comment, no doubt born of the pandemic’s frustrations and miseries, highlighted a misconception. As the parents of children who receive special education services, we write to explain what really holds back every BPS student and how not passing the budget override on April 6 will only magnify the problem.

Many students have neurological conditions and other issues that necessitate having an Individualized Education Plan (IEP). An IEP specifies services, accommodations, and modifications required for each student and details goals. The document is legally binding, and no educator or administrator can cherry pick services to provide from the IEP or eliminate goals because staffing and funding are just too difficult.

Currently, our very lean school budget means not having critical special education positions for Belmont’s elementary schools. These positions are not “an extra,” as Butler parent and middle school special educator Stephanie Crement wrote in The Belmontonian. In other districts, people in these positions, among other things, complete legally mandated and time-intensive compliance paperwork. Otherwise “those responsibilities fall solely on the teachers and school psychologists,” Crement wrote, meaning less time for Belmont’s dedicated educators to teach all children.

In 2012, a Winn Brook School kindergarten class had fewer than 20 students. At Chenery Middle School, science classrooms have reached or exceeded 30 students in recent years. The Superintendent’s recent budget report to the School Committee details some BHS core academic classes already had as many as 35 students in 2019-2020. This alarming change in class sizes has occurred because from 2010 to 2020, the Belmont Public School total enrollment grew by 21 percent, an additional 823 students. Two Massachusetts Department of Education statistics testify to the effect of the surging enrollment: Belmont falls in the bottom 3 percent in Massachusetts for class size and in the bottom 6 percent in per pupil expenditure. Belmont’s per pupil expenditure falls behind Fall River, Holyoke, and Revere and far behind Concord, Newton, and Weston.

Providing the level of support, accommodations and modifications necessary for students with special education services in a class of 15 to 20 students gets significantly more difficult — and thus requires more individual classroom support — when classes reach 25 to 30 students. A student’s IEP legally binds BPS to provide this individual support. But legal mandate or not, we cannot realistically expect our children, or anyone else’s, to receive the same care and individual attention needed to thrive fully in a 57-minute class with 35 students compared to the attention received in a class of 15 to 20.

Here is what all parents need to know about a critical reason BPS could not provide live, synchronous learning for all students during the WIN blocks: it simply lacked the teachers to do so. Here is what all BPS students — regardless of receiving special education services — face if they return to school in September without an override’s additional funding: 22 fewer teachers and staff than if the override had passed and a $564,760 reduction in programs beginning this summer — arts, athletics and anything else that can be cut. However, with an override’s funding, BPS can hire elementary school special education professionals, teachers for CMS and BHS, and a high school social worker to help all students with mental health challenges. Shell-shocked by the pandemic, many kids will be crying out for a social worker’s help to reintegrate socially and academically.

As parents of children who receive special education services, we support the override because this funding is necessary for the success of our own children. We also know that passing the override is good for ALL of Belmont’s students. To conclude, we quote a recent Belmont Citizen Herald op-ed from BHS students appealing for parents to support the override:

“As of October 2020, the Belmont Public Schools had around 4,700 students. Fewer than four percent of these students are eligible to vote, making our voices almost entirely unheard in an issue in which each student is directly impacted by your vote.”

“The future of Belmont’s students lies in your hands. Please remember us when you vote.”

  • Roger Fussa, Chenery Middle School
  • Amani Abu Shakara, LABBB
  • Charles Bandes and Patsy Collins Bandes, Butler School
  • Amy M. Brown, Chenery Middle School
  • Amy Frasco, Wellington School
  • Helen Josephine, Chenery Middle School
  • Dawn Mampreian, Butler School
  • Kara Morin, Chenery Middle School
  • Abigail Myers, Butler School

Opinion: Protect Our Town Employees and Seniors With A ‘Yes’ Vote On The Override

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Photo: A vote to pass the override will ensure seniors and town employees are protected

ln his guest column in a local publication dated Feb. 18, “Please Join Me ln Voting ‘Yes,” former Selectman Ralph Jones suggests ways of reducing town expenses including asking town employees to help pay for them. He wrote “reducing compensation through union negotiations would depend on the expiration dates of existing contracts.”

ls it fair or appropriate for Jones, or any elected official or administrator in town including the Select Board or the town administrator, to expect town employees, through a reduction in compensation or benefits, to help pay for the ongoing increases in town expenses?

Residents, administrators and elected officials regularly advocate for new services and facilities but we are reluctant to pay for them and are dismayed when we receive our new real estate tax bills. We, as a town voted, through our town meeting members, for an expensive new high and middle school. Now we have to pay for it.

Regarding additional school services, Jones writes “increasingly, schools also are not simply educating students, they are also caring for their social and emotional needs. This expands the type of employees that must be part of the school system.” I agree with him and will be voting for the override in April.

As residents, we Belmontians want excellent services and top flight facilities and we have them. We want our schools to be among the best in the state. As taxpayers many of us are shocked and angry at how expensive our excellent quality of life costs us.

The town has a limited commercial tax base so we residential taxpayers have to rely on ourselves to fund the facilities and services we choose to have. Going forward, I see overrides every several years as an uncomfortable but routine aspect of living here.

For years there has been talk of helping seniors, who may be having trouble paying their real estate taxes, stay in their homes but I’m not aware of any follow through regarding this issue. ln order for overrides to be successful I believe this issue needs to be effectively addressed.

Our town employees are an integral and valued part of our community. They contribute to our quality of life in ways we often do not notice. I’m in favor of the police and fire department employees keeping their Civil Service protections and of fair compensation and benefits for all town employees.

Dick Madden
Retired Town Meeting Member
Pleasant Street

Opinion: At This Crossroads, Why School Funding Matters

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Photo: Why school funding is critical now

By Stephanie J. Crement

I have been a public-school educator for the past 22 years and currently work as a middle school special educator. I have two children at Butler Elementary School, where I believe they have received and continue to receive an excellent education. However, we are now at a crossroads in our town, and I am very concerned that if we do not pass the override on April 6, our schools will be unable to maintain the high quality of education from which my children and many others have benefitted.

We talk about how we value education in Belmont, yet Belmont spends less than other towns in Massachusetts in nearly every category of the school budget. Belmont is already in the bottom three percent in Massachusetts in number of teachers per 100 students (class size) and in the bottom six percent in Massachusetts in per pupil expenditure. A failed override would make our teacher-student ratio even worse. That funding – or lack thereof – plays out in real ways in the classroom.

One way funding plays out is with class size. In my experience, class size DOES matter. To be sure, highly skilled teachers know how to manage large classes and to differentiate to meet the needs of many students with various needs. But those who say that the size of the class does not significantly affect the experience of the student and the teacher have spent little time in actual K-12 classrooms. The more students there are in the classroom, the less individual attention each student receives during the school day.  During a 57-minute class period, there simply isn’t time for a teacher to check in with 28 students individually. Large class sizes mean fewer opportunities for students and teachers to connect, for students to get feedback, and for students to ask questions and have those questions answered. There is less time for teachers to discover students’ passions and to assess where students might be struggling.  

What is less obvious is that with each additional student, a teacher’s workload increases exponentially. It can mean an additional 30 minutes per child spent reading an essay or grading a math assessment and writing constructive feedback. It can mean an additional hour preparing for, holding, and following up after a parent-teacher conference for each additional child. It’s not that teachers are unwilling to do this. In fact, every Belmont Schools educator who has taught our two children has worked well beyond contractual hours to prepare lessons, communicate with us, and give our students feedback. Moreover, children’s needs extend beyond academics. When our high school cannot hire a social worker, it doesn’t mean that children don’t bring their concerns to school.  It means that helping students work through problems is another part of what teachers and other school-based staff members do, putting additional stresses on their time.

What Belmont doesn’t have in dollars, my children’s dedicated teachers at Butler make up for in energy, hard work, and time.  However, time is a limited resource.  At some point, it just runs out. With increasing enrollment, we will not be able to maintain the quality of education upon which Belmont prides itself, and we certainly won’t be able to make improvements and add new programs. If the override fails, it is our students who will suffer. 

Some might say that research about class size is inconclusive. Let me tell you what is NOT inconclusive:  the importance of the teacher. In fact, it is incredibly well-documented that the most important school-related factor that affects student achievement is teacher quality. Just because our Belmont educators and administrators have worked with fewer resources than our neighboring schools does not mean that we should continue to underfund our schools. Just because the best teachers make it look easy does not mean the burden isn’t heavy. Without this override, I fear that the work will be too heavy to bear, and our schools will not be able to maintain their reputation for excellence.  

We will not be able to retain high quality, experienced educators with large class sizes and without the resources that most other districts around us can offer.  We will not be able to attract more teachers of color to join an overwhelmingly white teaching staff when they can choose districts with smaller class sizes and more resources.

Our lean school budget is not a source of pride or a sign of fiscal responsibility. It means that our children, especially those with learning differences who often need extra time and specialized instruction, aren’t getting what they need and deserve. As a special education professional, I was particularly  shocked to learn that our elementary schools do not have Special Education Chairs. Children who receive special education services have Individual Education Plans (IEP), legally binding documents that outline how the child learns and the services, accommodations, and modifications the student requires as well as the goals that the child is working to achieve. Special educators spend time assessing students, differentiating for student needs, modifying curriculum, and providing accommodations so that students can be successful and master their IEP goals. These are practices in which all good teachers engage. Another facet of a special educator’s job is completing compliance related paperwork.  This paperwork is critical for our students on IEPs to ensure they are receiving the services they need. It is also very onerous and time intensive.  Without Special Education Chairs, those responsibilities fall solely on the teachers and school psychologists. This often leaves those educators with even less time to prepare lessons or provide feedback to students. Hiring special education chairs is not an extra; it allows classroom teachers to devote their time to the job of teaching. 

I hear people say: Belmont students have done well, so why do the schools keep asking for more? For my family, like many others I know, the excellent reputation of the school system is one of the reasons we moved to Belmont.  Many Belmont students do well on standardized tests, an important but very limited measure. However, I’ve spoken with many parents and caregivers of students who receive special education services, or even those who might not have been identified, who say their students are not receiving all the services they need. That’s not because the teachers who work with them are not excellent or hardworking. It’s because our system does not have the capacity to do more. An education system that prides itself on being excellent must be committed to serving ALL students, not just those for whom learning comes easily.  

For years, Belmont educators have done so much with very little, but this isn’t a trip to the dollar bin at Target. It isn’t a game where we try to get as much as we can with as little as possible. These are our children’s futures.  If we say we value education, it’s time that the funding we provide truly reflects that sentiment.  

Please vote yes for the override on April 6.

Stephanie J. Crement

Harris Street

It Won’t Be Pretty: Consequences Of A Failed Override Prompts Select Board To Endorse Its Passage

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Photo:

The date: April 6, 2021. The time: 9(-ish) p.m. The location: Belmont Town Hall. Town Clerk Ellen Cushman strolls out from her office to read the results of the annual Town Election. After going through the races for elected positions, she comes to what residents have been waiting for – the decision on the $6.4 million Proposition 2 1/2 override. Cushman clears her throat and reads out the count.

And the measure … fails.

The first question for many people will be: “Now what?”

On Monday, Feb. 8 – just under two month from the above election – the Belmont Select Board and residents were provided an answer to The Day After scenario as Town Administrator Patrice Garvin spelled out the rather dark consequences of a no vote throughout the fiscal year 2022 budget.

“There’s no way to sugar coat it really. They’re all painful which is way we asked for an override,” said Board Chair Roy Epstein.

While Belmont not yet on the level of the four horsemen of fiscal apocalypses, the certainty of cuts in services and personnel as well as still to be determined retreat on school programs, the Select Board unanimously voted to endorse passage of the Proposition 2 1/2 override on the April 6 ballot.

Note: On Thursday, Feb. 11, at 7 p.m., the Warrant Committee is holding a Zoom public meeting on “Understanding the Override Decision” that will present the impact of a yes and no override vote.

After reporting last month how a yes vote on the override would be used by the town and schools. the town proceeded to run a budget exercise on the impact of a negative response by voters. With expenditures of $163 million as opposed to revenues of $157.2 million, the town would need to fill a $5.7 million gap.

Garvin said a little more than a third of the gap would be bridged using an additional $1.9 million from free cash – the last of the reserves not reserved by town policy – and taking $350,000 of the $400,000 OPEB contribution. The remaining $3.45 million would be made up reducing town and school expenditures, 60 percent – or $2.07 million – coming from the schools and 40 percent ($1.38 million) from the town.

On the town side, cuts would come from all departments (see the chart below) as well as removing $500,000 from discretionary capital expenditures that was targeting much needed maintenance and infrastructure repairs.

Cuts to town departments with a negative override vote. (Credit: Town Administrator Office)

Garvin pointed out that long sought after positions such as a social worker for seniors and a new procurement employee to manage the increasingly complex nature of bidding and preparing projects such as the new Middle and High School.

“We really do need someone who has the expertise, who can move through the commissioning process as [the new school building] gets handed over and can run all the town buildings more efficiently,” said Adam Dash, board member. “I fear that if we don’t have that person in place, it will actually cost us more money because the systems won’t be run properly.”

Other departments will see significant reduction in salary and overtime requests while Police, Fire and DPW will see the loss of at least one staff member which will reduce response times for public safety and less work done at town fields and playgrounds.

The board’s decision to endorse a yes vote was expected, “especially in light of these pretty draconian and grim looking cuts. It’s going to be a difficult situation if it doesn’t pass,” said Dash.

While the school cuts will be announced on Tuesday, Belmont Superintendent John Phelan told the Financial Task Force on Monday morning that the schools would loss the 10.6 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions they had planned to add in 2022 as well as 15 additional staff members and cuts in many line items.

If the April override fails, the town is looking at a second override for the Town Election in 2022. Quick calculations by the Financial Task Force on Monday morning indicated that the subsequent override would be in the range of $10.8 million over three years, give or take a million either way.

How Much Will The Override Add To Your Tax Bill? Belmont Has A Calculator For That

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Photo: The town has created a calculator to determine your taxes with a successful override. (Credit: Wikipedia)

One of the burning questions that many homeowners have with the proposed $6.4 million Proposition 2 1/2 override is “how much will it cost me?” The first estimate from town officials gave a general idea of the price tag: about an extra $900 per year on the “average” property valued at $1,125,000.

But that round figure was not cutting it for many owners who asked the town in previous public meetings to come up with someway make the cost a bit more specific.

They asked, and the town now has the answer. The town has created the Override Impact Calculator, a simple application in which all a person needs to do is input their address and the calculator will take the latest assessed value and calculate both the override amount and the annual 2 1/2 percent tax increase.

“This came out of [Financial] Task Force meetings with the hope to get more information to the residents,” said Town Administrator Patrice Garvin who helped introduce the override calculator at the Select Board meeting on Monday, Feb. 1.

“This is an opportunity for us to get beyond just the averages and talk about specifically how individual homeowners and taxpayers are impact so I think it’s great,” said Board member Tom Caputo, who is also the chair of the task force.

Select Board Approves Placing $6.4M Override On April’s Town Election Ballot

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Photo: An override will be on the April 6 town election ballot.

The Belmont Select Board unanimously accepted the Financial Task Force’s recommendation to place a $6.4 million Proposition 2 1/2 override on the April 6, 2021, town election ballot.

While the vote comes in the midst of a year long pandemic which has wounded the local and national economy, there is few alternatives other than huge cuts in town services – with massive layoffs – and a retreat on nearly a decade of investments in teaching and student growth.

“It’s never the right time or a good year to ask for this … but the situation has put us in a point where we have no choice,” said the Select Board’s Adam Dash.

Select Board’s Tom Caputo, who also chaired the Task Force, said working for the past two years using a multi-year financial forecasting modeling tool from the Collins Center at UMass/Boston to help make more precise results from projections and data allowed him to “appreciate the financial challenges ahead of us and the importance of an override to maintain fiscal stability for the town.”

I am very comfortable with the recommendation that we brought to the town,” he said.

If approved by voters, homeowners would see a $900 pop in property taxes on the “average” valued house pegged at $1.25 million.

The override amount is approximately half the $12.5 million the Select Board approved back in July.

“I think that’s progress,” said Roy Epstein, chair of the Select Board.

Flush with nearly $11.2 million in free cash certified by the state – an amount historically higher than most years through minimizing expenditures during last year’s COVID crisis – and the recent forecast of state and local revenues will be higher than pervious years, town will leverage the onetime windfall to help moderate the override’s size, said Caputo.

After setting aside portions of free cash according to decade long town guidelines, the town will take $8.2 million in free cash and spread it over three years from ’22 to ’24. Include $3.2 million in additional state aid in fiscal ’22 split between fiscal years ’23 and ’24.

The task force forecasts that Belmont would be facing a debt of $8.3 million by fiscal ’24 on an annual budget of $166.7 million.

The override would allow the town to support a “minimal level service budget” as it will maintain town services with “very very small additional positions” such as a social worker at the Senior Center, said Dash.

But for several residents who commented during the public comment portion of the meeting, just the tiniest jump in taxes would be devastating to many.

“Any dollar increase for us right now is too much considering the thousands of dollars in revenue that we’ve all lost and the percentage of business down,” said Deran Muckjian, a lifelong resident and owner of The Toy Shop of Belmont on Leonard Street.

Dawn McCarren said a lot of good ideas have come from the task force “but the town will survive without an override.”

“I realize that there will be cuts but families are at stake and this is extremely difficult pill to swallow, forcing some to sell homes where residents lived for multigenerationd,” she said.

No short-term solution

But the Board contend the town has not other short-term option but to back placing the override on the ballot.

“I recognize that we have a lot of folks in the community that are in economically challenging times as a result of COVID, that are on fixed incomes for which this tax is an incredible burden and it’s hard for us to solve,” said Caputo.

“At the end of the day, this override is indicated by the facts and the realities and as such it needs to be put on the ballot,” Caputo said.

A delay, said Epstein, would made a bad situation even worse, as cuts would be made to services, nearly the entire free cash account would be used in one year which would imperil the town’s “gold standard” AAA bond rating and ultimately require a much more robust override amount in 2023.

Epstein also wanted to dampen down any suggestions that, as one resident said in an email, voters suspect the funds raised through the override would be spent on “grandiose capital projects.” The reality, he said, was the additional funds will be directed to operating expenses such as paying for teacher salaries while continue vital infrastructure projects.

Epstein did acknowledge the fiscal ’22 education expenses accedes what he believes is a minimal level but that is due to the district introducing a new school – the Chenery Middle School at the high school location – in the next two years and to maintain “considerable progress” its has invested in over the past five years.

School costs will continue to lead the way adding more than 32 FTE (Full-time equivalent) positions in the next three years “to address increase in enrollment, grade configuration and what the school committee’s vision for the future,” said Patrice Garvin, town administrator, at last week’s meeting of the Select Board.

Enrollment changes FY ’20 to FY ’24

Yet also noting that an override will have little impact on the town’s structural deficit in which revenues are unable to match expenses due to annual limits on property tax increases while education costs due to students entering the district – a 1,000 new pupils in just the past few years – has far outpaced revenues.

Dash said the town has created two new committee, the Structural Budget Impact Group and Long-term Capital Budget Planning Committee, which will look for opportunities to increase revenues and decrease expenses. Around March, the town will open a portal on the town’s web site where people will be able to put in any structural change suggestions for the boards to review.

“There are no stupid ideas, every idea will be looked at and vetted, put into a matrix and analyzed,” said Dash.

Looking into the horizon, Epstein believes Belmont may finally see by 2026 some stability or even slight decrease in the decade of sky rocking enrollment – greater than 10 percent over the past 10 years – in town schools which will in turn decrease the need to hire teachers, staff and other expenses.

“As soon as there’s stability in the number of schoolchildren instead of this continuous very rapid growth that will give us a lot more flexibility in managing the budget,” he said.

Greater detail on the budget planning for the next three fiscal years can be found in the documents at the Town of Belmont website.

In addition, Belmont Media Center has recorded Financial Task Force meetings.