BUCKLAND — The Selectboard has approved a budget increase for fiscal year 2026 that, if approved by Annual Town Meeting voters, would bring all staff members up to a wage of at least $20 per hour.

If the budget is approved by voters in May, all staff members will receive a cost-of-living increase of 3% that will be coupled with a raise of 50 cents per hour, and four staff members will get additional raises so they are paid a minimum of $20 an hour for their work. Town Administrator Heather Butler said the raises will ensure all Buckland staff members are paid fairly.

“Some of our staff were still not at the $20 an hour mark, so I made very small modifications to the salary line to bring everybody up to at least $20 an hour,” Butler said. “I don’t feel that it’s fair to pay any of our staff less than $20.

Butler said the four staff members who will get additional raises so they are paid $20 an hour for their work are two Transfer Station attendants, an assistant librarian and a board clerk. The raises amount to an average of an additional dollar per hour and make up less than a $2,000 increase in the budget.

“I’d really like to see this year be the year employees come out on top,” Butler said. “I don’t want them to end up on the budget cutting room floor.”

Butler said setting the cost-of-living increase is a step toward finishing the budget, but the town is still waiting on final assessment numbers from Franklin County Technical School and for its shared policing services with Shelburne. The budget will be finished in the coming weeks in preparation for Town Meeting.

“You always start out with such high hopes that this year will be different and it’s not,” Butler said. “We’re still cutting it close to the wire.”

Reach Madison Schofield at 413-930-4579 or mschofield@recorder.com.