ORANGE — Even if voters approve the recommended $21,353,712.07 budget next week, the town is still not out of the woods.
With expenses exceeding revenues, that budget is contingent on a Proposition 2½ tax override vote passing. The Annual Town Meeting, at which the budget will be voted, is this Monday, June 17 at 7 p.m. at the Town Hall. The override vote will be July 29.
The Finance Committee revealed Wednesday night the override will ask for an additional $513,971 via Proposition 2½ — a state statute allowing towns to raise more than normally allowed from real estate and personal property taxes, which is 2½ percent.
The $513,971 is 2.4 percent of the total recommended budget. But funding that 2.4 percent is contingent on a vote that has failed in Orange in the past. If the budget passes but the override fails, Orange must cut the budget to make up the difference.
Even at 2.4 percent, the override is asking for a good amount less than the original $730,000 budgetary shortfall revealed earlier in the year, when departments began giving the Finance Committee their proposed budgets, and it became obvious the town’s revenue was not going to be enough to cover the costs.
From $730,000 to $513,971, the Finance Committee had to make cuts to the proposed budget, particularly the Orange Elementary Schools’ requested budget. Originally, the elementary schools asked for about a $600,000 increase — 9 percent — over this year. This was controversial, because the stated reason for such a large increase — the hiring of 11 new staff during the school year — was seen as lacking transparency from the Selectboard and members of the Finance Committee.
“I have little interest in funding the schools with an override,” said Selectboard Chairman Ryan Mailloux at a meeting in May. “As a taxpayer, I’m kind of feeling shoved around.”
Amid the controversy, the Selectboard voted not to support more than a $300,000 increase for the elementary schools, and the Finance Committee followed suit by cutting the proposed increase in half. Orange’s elementary schools alone take up around 31 percent of the entire budget — education in total takes up around 55 percent.
Fisher Hill Elementary School this year had extensive problems with student behavior, with students in the kindergarten and first grade destroying classrooms and attacking classmates. This led to frequent evacuations of classrooms to other sections of the school — one teacher said she had evacuated around 30 times by December.
Also, Fisher Hill’s principal, Maureen Donelan, was placed on paid leave for months and ultimately fired, despite having strong public support and having been cleared by the state of allegations of abuse and neglect.
It is unclear how much the Fisher Hill disruptions and principal situation have to do with the new hires because school officials have remained tight-lipped, citing the need for confidentiality. The lack of information was at the heart of criticism toward the schools’ requested budget increase.
“I’d like to know the nature and extent of the problems that precipitated the 11 new hires,” Wrigley said, asking for a written explanation from the School Committee at a joint meeting in May. “With the new hires that’s 11 percent (staffing increase) in one year. I’ve been in this business almost 30 years, I haven’t seen such a thing.”
“I’m kind of over wondering who got hired, and what they do and whether they are needed or not,” said Selectboard Vice Chairwoman Jane Pierce. “When the fire chief wanted to hire personnel for the SAFER grant, we got detailed, precise analysis.”
On Wednesday, Orange Elementary School Committee Vice Chairman Alex Schwanz came before the Finance Committee and said if the override does not pass, the schools will have to cut “about four staff members,” up to five total.
Some classes would likely be consolidated, leading to more students per class, Schwanz said — 25 students per class in the fourth through sixth grades as opposed to 22 or 23 currently.
Consolidation would be focused on the higher grades because “those students we can watch less,” Schwanz said. “When it comes to the lower grades, given the problems we had this year… we thought it was not appropriate to reduce teachers at that level.”
Schwanz said the cut positions would be teachers and one counselor that was part of the recent mid-year hires.
If the override passes, Schwanz said school officials believe the schools would keep all of their current staff but would still have to tap into other areas of the education budget like school choice.
In addition to the increases in staffing, Orange’s schools suffer underfunding from the state in two areas. Rural schools spend more on transportation compared to urban schools, yet the state’s formula for determining funding for public schools, known as Chapter 70, has no “rurality factor” to make up for this.
Also, Chapter 70 shortchanges Orange when it comes to special education by more than $3 million by using an “assumed percentage” to calculate how much the town needs for special education students. In other words, the state assumes Orange has 22 in-district special education students out of its total 613 elementary school students — 3.75 percent. In reality, Orange has 159 such students.
Orange is a poor community, relatively, in Massachusetts, with the state’s ninth-lowest median annual household income according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey from 2013-17.
Former state representative and Orange resident Denise Andrews spoke to the increasing tax rates in town and the burden they bear on residents.
“I moved back here in 2009,” Andrews said. “I’m not so sure I’m going to stay… for two reasons. The tax base — my taxes have gone from four grand to $8,000… in a town that has one of the lowest salaries in the commonwealth.”
“So, when I look at my family which has fixed-income people, unemployment, my costs have doubled,” she added. “The second reason I’d move is the culture, but we’re here to talk taxes.”
Reach David McLellan at dmclellan@recorder.com or 413-772-0261, ext. 268.