LEYDEN — In anticipation of a lengthy discussion, the Selectboard will present the $160,837 Franklin County Technical School assessment and $1.02 million Pioneer Valley Regional School assessment as independent articles, rather than including them in the total operating budget at Monday’s Annual Town Meeting.
The meeting will start at 6 p.m. at Town Hall on West Leyden Road for deliberation on 29 articles. The articles include $43,500 for Highway Department improvement projects, bylaw changes such as amending the accessory dwelling unit bylaw (ADU) that was approved last year, a nearly $1.22 million operating budget and the school assessments.
Selectboard member Katherine DiMatteo said that while the Pioneer budget has already been approved by Bernardston and Northfield, and is “basically approved,” she hopes pulling the educational expenses out from the operating budget will allow people to discuss the impact that education funding has on the town.
“We decided to separate it because it’s such a large portion of our budget. We really wanted to show that those are equal to or higher than our operating budget and the impact it has when we’re making decisions on the operating budget,” DiMatteo said. “In Bernardston, Northfield and Leyden, we’ve pulled every possible penny that wasn’t being used to pay for it. We’re not gonna have that next year. … We want people to be aware of the situation.”
Of the total $2.35 million to be raised and appropriated, 42.8% will go to Pioneer and 6.8% will go to Franklin Tech.
Article 17 asks voters to pay the town’s $35,995 assessment for its share of Franklin Tech costs. This is a 28.83% increase over fiscal year 2026 and represents a per-pupil expenditure of $13,203 per student. This budget has been recommended by both the Selectboard and Finance Committee.
The Selectboard, however, is not recommending the Pioneer budget, which voters will weigh in on in Article 18. Including operating and capital costs, Leyden’s assessment to Pioneer is up $121,248, or 13.5%, to a total of nearly $1.02 million. The total Pioneer budget, which was approved by the School Committee in February, is $18.2 million and covers contractual increases to staff salaries, health insurance and special education tuition costs.
DiMatteo said that while the percent increase of the tech budget is higher than Pioneer, the Selectboard felt the tech school budget is justified due to the number of students enrolled.
Leyden has a 48.5-student, five-year enrollment average, and as of December 2025, had 45 students enrolled across the district.
“It’s not a criticism of Pioneer, it’s just a reality check,” DiMatteo said. “Next year we’re going to be in a worse position, and if the school budget continued to be 50% of our budget, we’re gonna need to cut more of our operating budget.”
Article 19 addresses the $1.22 million operating budget, which represents a 1.78% increase over the FY26 budget. Larger increases to the budget include a $4,663 increase to town clerk election expenses, a $39,188 increase to hourly fire employee pay, and a $4,253 increase in retirement benefits.
DiMatteo said this year the town had to turn down requests for raises and programs from various departments, and in the future it could lead to current programs and services being cut. Line items that faced cuts this year included Board of Health training, veterans benefits, the tree warden stipend, and the fire chief, assistant fire chief, and fire chief captain will become volunteer positions without stipends.
“There’s going to be choices that we’re going to have to make, and they’re going to be serious ones,” DiMatteo said.
Voters will also see accessory dwelling units (ADUs) on the warrant again, because while voters approved the ADU bylaw last spring, the attorney general’s office disapproved portions that required that the principal dwelling must already be in existence, maintain at least one off-street parking space, and follow the setback requirements for single-family homes. In a letter to the town, Assistant Attorney General Tasheena Davis wrote that the regulations are more restrictive than state law and are therefore not allowed.
“Neither G.L. c. 40A, § 3 nor the regulations limit an ADU to only an ‘existing’ structure,
or an ‘existing’ accessory structure, but instead allow an ADU ‘on the same lot as a principal dwelling,'” Davis wrote. “Therefore, an ADU could be constructed at the same time as a new principal dwelling or new accessory structure is constructed. Limiting an ADU to only a lot with an ‘existing’ structure or an ‘existing’ accessory structure, as opposed to a lot with a principal dwelling, conflicts with the statute and regulations.”
The attorney general’s office also disapproved a portion of a separate article from last year’s Town Meeting that would have removed basements from the square footage calculation. The Planning Board had hoped that doing so would have allowed for ADUs to be built with basements, without eating up the allowed 1,200 square feet. This year residents will vote on an amendment to the ADU bylaw that the Planning Board hopes will achieve that effect by stating, “In calculating the 1,200 square foot maximum gross floor area of a new protected, or additional ADU, but not the principal dwelling, the square footage of a basement will not be included.”
Other articles on the warrant include:
- Article 11 — $43,500 for the installation of a new ventilation system at the Highway Department building, a roof for the container building and repairs to the salt shed.
- Article 20 — transferring $39,924 from the Building Needs Study, Town Hall Stage Curtain Repair, and Repair Town Offices Roofs Account to offset FY27 operating expenses.
- Article 25 — discontinuing a portion of old East Hill Road, also known as North Bernardston Road, which is no longer in public use and sits on private property.
- A citizen’s petition article to endorse a single payer healthcare system proposed by An Act Establishing Medicare for All in Massachusetts (H.1405/S.860.
Prior to the Annual Town Meeting, a Special Town Meeting will be called at 5:45 p.m. to approve paying $19,632 in bills from last year and using broadband retained earnings to pay $4,109 in bills from last year.
The full warrant for both annual and special town meetings can be read at townofleyden.com.
