BUCKLAND — After a tumultuous start to budget season saw two of the Mohawk Trail Regional School District’s eight member towns vote down their operating assessments at their respective Annual Town Meetings, the proposed $28.9 million fiscal year 2027 budget has gained enough support from the remaining member towns to take effect July 1.
Plainfield was the final community in the district to approve its school assessment on May 30, making it the sixth member town to support the school budget.
“It was really important that Plainfield pass it, and now we do have a full budget going into the next school year,” Superintendent Sheryl Stanton said. “But I do think it’s an indication of the towns’ real challenge with balancing the increased costs for things like health care and benefits.”
The two member towns that voted their school operating assessments down were Buckland and Colrain in early May. Colrain narrowly voted down the budget, 48-44, while the margin was larger in Buckland, 88-65. Buckland’s assessment, the largest of the eight member towns, came in at $3.29 million, while Colrain’s was $2.78 million.
In the case of both Buckland and Colrain, residents said they were trying to send a message to Beacon Hill that the state aid formula is unsustainable, and they felt that the only way to get Boston’s attention would be to vote down the assessments.
“We have had flat Chapter 70 funding from the state for 20 years, and with the Student Opportunity Act, you’re now seeing over 230 communities that are in the same position we’ve been in for 20 years,” Stanton said. “There’s recognition on the state side that the funding formula is flawed, that it needs to be looked at again.”
If Mohawk Trail’s proposed $28.9 million budget did not pass, and no alternative budget was approved by the start of the new fiscal year on July 1, the district would have shifted to a one-twelfth budget, meaning it would not be able to spend more than one-twelfth of its fiscal year 2026 budget in any given month. The FY26 budget was $27.2 million.
Stanton previously said that using the FY26 budget figures would mean that “every extracurricular for students is removed,” and an estimated 20 additional staff positions would be cut, on top of the 21.5 that had already been eliminated as part of the original $28.9 million budget proposal.
The 21.5 positions include 6.5 teaching positions, 14 paraprofessionals and one other position. More than 40% of the 21.5 positions that are being eliminated in FY27 were ones that were unfilled, and responsibilities will be shifted to remaining staff members.
School Committee Chair Martha Thurber said the “first round of analysis” of prospective school consolidation shows that “it would save the towns money.” To prepare for that possibility, the district recently trimmed the number of School Choice seats that it will offer in the 2026-2027 school year to ensure there will be enough space for existing Mohawk Trail students.
“We recognize that Colrain and Buckland voted no because they feel like the assessments are not sustainable, and that’s why we’re working with the [Two Districts, Eight Towns (2D8T) Steering Committee],” Stanton said, “and why we’re trying to make some recommendations and changes to the structure of the school district, so that we can both lower our operating costs and also improve the educational programming that all students would have access to.”
