The budget season is officially underway

Town Manager Crabtree briefs selectmen on his preliminary spending plan for the 2027 Fiscal Year

By Mark E. Vogler

Town Manager Scott C. Crabtree has recommended $35.8 million for the School Department for the 2027 Fiscal Year that begins July 1 – about a million dollar increase over the Fiscal Year 2026 budget approved last spring by the Annual Town Meeting. That’s still about $2 million less than the proposed Saugus Public Schools budget recommended by Superintendent Michael Hashem and approved by the School Committee earlier this year. But during his annual unveiling of the preliminary budget in the first floor conference room at Town Hall Tuesday (Feb. 24) morning, Crabtree stressed that the town would be spending considerably more on School Department-related expenses if his proposed spending plan is approved by Town Meeting, which convenes on May 4.

He noted that the School Department’s recommended budget doesn’t include close to $30 million in so-called School Department Schedule-19 charges – which includes the health insurance. “The increase does not include the indirect costs paid by the Town on behalf of the School Department and included as part of the total Net School Spending (NSS) calculation required by the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE),” Crabtree said, as he read from a four-page budget message that accompanied his proposed budget for the 2027 Fiscal Year.

The preliminary spending plan unveiled by the town manager includes municipal general fund operating budgets totaling $88.5 million to go with proposed school spending, which adds up to an estimated $124.3 million in total general fund operating budgets. The $17.2 million for the Water and Sewer Enterprise Funds added to the total estimated Expenditure Budget adds up to a total Fiscal Year 2027 expenditure amount of $141.5 million.

Selectmen voted unanimously to recommend the town manager’s operating budget, forwarding it to the Finance Committee, which will soon begin hearings on each department budget before making its recommendations to the Annual Town Meeting, which is set to convene on May 4.

During the Tuesday morning session, Crabtree expressed frustration with the recurring argument that surfaces during the town’s annual budget debate this time every year – that the schools are being underfunded. “The problem with the schools, they’re just asking for the money,” the town manager said. He suggested that it might be a good idea to prepare a public presentation “to show what the actual costs are.”

Selectman Jeffrey Cicolini suggested that the Schedule 19 money be highlighted as a separate use of funds so it’s more clear to the public how much money is spent on Saugus Public Schools. “For this document, we’re almost doing ourselves a disservice,” Cicolini said.

“Right now, their [School Department] argument is ‘we need more money,’” Cicolini said.

Crabtree stressed that educational performance – not the need for spending more on education – should be the real focus. “We should be demanding better education,” Crabtree said.

“The conversation should be brought to the School Department. We should be demanding higher standards, higher expectations,” he said.

The snow and ice deficit could be substantial this year. “The cost of snow and ice events is always a concern as at any time we can have a snow or sanding/salting event in the upcoming weeks,” Crabtree said in his budget message.

“As you have seen, this winter we are back to a normal New England winter where snow events are occurring on a weekly basis,” he said.

Crabtree identified several challenges in preparing the estimates of expenditures in his recommended FY 2027 budget:

–Health Insurance – the rates have not been finalized by the provider. The town can expect the rates will be set within the next few months, which means the town administration will have to modify its estimates later in the budget process.

–Other insurance – the various property, liability and workers’ compensation insurance premium costs won’t be available until sometime later in the spring. Estimates have been budgeted based on an increase of about 14 percent.

–Trash hauling and disposal – the cost of waste collection and recyclable materials continues to increase.

–Pension Contribution – the pension appropriated for FY 2027 is more than $6 million.

–Regional School Assessments – vocational education that includes Northeast Metropolitan Regional Vocational High School and Essex North Shore Tech are budgeted for nearly $3 million. The estimated assessments reflect a 12 percent increase on the FY 2026 assessments.

–Construction of the new Northeast Metropolitan Regional Vocational High School is well underway and nearing completion. Based on the most recent debt information provided by Northeast Regional, the town’s share of existing debt service for FY 2007 is $776,167 – an increase of $225,796 from the current fiscal year.