HAWLEY — A 8.14% increase in the town budget over fiscal year 2026, an 18.68% increase in the education assessment and transferring money to cover a snow removal deficit are among the topics voters will be presented with at Hawley’s Annual Town Meeting.
The meeting will be held at 7 p.m. on Monday, May 11, outside the Town Office at 8 Pudding Hollow Road. Voters will decide the outcome of 29 warrant articles, all of them relating to finances in some way.
Article 3 is the town’s fiscal year 2027 operating budget, while Article 4 is the education budget. The biggest budget driver behind the 18.68% jump in the education budget is a $120,000 increase in the vocational school assessment, bringing it to $190,000. The Mohawk Trail Regional School District assessment is $251,944, rising by $8,263 over FY26, while the Hawlemont Regional School District assessment is $234,221, down $21,858.
“Hawley generally is extremely supportive of our schools, and I don’t think our assessment is huge this year,” Administrative Assistant Tinky Weisblat said, “so I don’t think that’s a major issue. In general, I think everything is pretty normal and should go smoothly.”
Hawley’s omnibus budget saw the biggest increases in salaries for Department of Public Works staff and insurance for town employees. Insurance went up $9,550 while salaries for DPW staff increased by $23,600.
“A little extra for town employees, but not a lot,” Weisblat said.
After an exceptionally snowy winter, Article 18 asks voters if the town will appropriate $36,000 from the Highway Stabilization Fund to cover the snow removal deficit. Any amount of money that is not spent from the $36,000 would be returned to the Highway Stabilization Fund.
“We’re way over [on the snow removal budget] from the winter because it was such a really scary winter,” Weisblat said. “When we last talked about it … the [state] Legislature was hoping to pass some sort of remedial help for towns, because I don’t think there’s a town in Massachusetts that didn’t go over its [snow removal] budget. That’s why we’re talking about returning any unexpected sum back to stabilization.”
“If the voters vote that down, then the overage would end up on the recap sheet, which basically means it would be on next year’s tax rate,” Selectboard member Hussain Hamdan added. “We want to have an open, honest and transparent conversation with the voters about the snow roads account situation. … One way or another, we’re going to have to pay the money.”
Article 28 asks voters to appropriate $10,000 to replace the heater at the Fire Station that stopped working earlier this year. While it’s not needed now as the summer months arrive, it will be needed again in the fall and the winter. The heater that needs to be replaced has been in the building for more than 40 years.
“[The heater] has served the town very well,” said Hamdan, who is also a firefighter. “Unfortunately, this kind of equipment ends up breaking down at some point or another. I would say it has more than paid for itself, and we just need to do this in the coming fiscal year.”
The full Annual Town Meeting Warrant can be viewed at townofhawley.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/ATM-Warrant-FY27-draft-for-Town-Report-FINAL.pdf.
