SHUTESBURY — With voters at Saturday’s annual Town Meeting agreeing to a revised formula for how Shutesbury pays its share of regional school costs, the $32.09 million budget for the Amherst-Pelham Regional Schools moved another step toward approval.
Residents, though, rejected a petition article that sought to use about half of the money in the town’s stabilization and free cash accounts, which totals about $1.69 million, to reduce the long-term borrowing approved in 2015 for a municipal broadband project.
By supporting the new assessment method by a 147-92 tally, despite concern that it has been unfair to Shutesbury, the town will have a $1.78 million assessment, which is a decrease of $320 from the current year.
The regional school assessment is part of a $6.59 million municipal budget that is $145,958, or 2.3 percent higher, than the current year’s $6.45 million budget. That budget includes $2.17 million for the elementary school.
Though the assessment formula was approved, residents were presented information about a long-standing concern that not using the statutory method to calculate assessments, which aims to help the towns with the least financial resources, is costing Shutesbury money.
Jeff Lacy, of Baker Road, who pushed for revisiting the matter, said Sunday that he was pleased discussion about whether the formula has been fair was aired.
“In general, people have not been aware of how the funding formulas play out for the region and Shutesbury, and how much has been expended above the statutory method,” Lacy said.
Lacy said these formulas have cost the town $2 million more over the past decade, and will mean an additional $311,477 in next year’s budget,
The decision means that Shutesbury joins Amherst and Leverett in approving the assessment method, with Pelham to decide at its Town Meeting May 11.
While some residents pushed to use rainy day funds to pay for half of the broadband project, Gayle Huntress, the municipal light plant manager, spoke against that idea. Huntress said it would be a more appropriate topic for discussion at the 2020 annual Town Meeting, after the broadband buildout is complete.
She observed the long-term bonds don’t have to be taken out for another 18 months. “At that time we’ll have a more comprehensive picture of what the whole project has cost and how much debt we’ll incur,” Huntress said in an email Sunday. “We can make a wiser choice then for how to leverage our town funds to minimize the tax burden for residents.”
In addition to Town Meeting, Shutesbury had its annual election Saturday. In the only contest on the ballot, for a three-year position on the Cemetery Commission, challenger Janice S. Stone of Montague Road, unseated incumbent Marilyn E. Tibbetts of Pelham Hill Road, 161-85.
Incumbents who won reelection unopposed included Melissa Makepeace-O’Neil of West Pelham Road, for Select Board, Catherine Hilton of Kinder Lane for Board of Health, Marilyn E. Tibbetts for constable, Bradley R. Foster, West Pelham Road, and Michele Regan-Ladd, Wendell Road, for library trustees, and Linda Feduik Rotondo of Leverett Road, Jeffrey R. Lacy of Baker Road and Robert S. Raymond, also of Baker Road, for Planning Board.
Paul J. Lyons of Old Orchard Road will be the new moderator, while unofficial write-in tallies showed Lauren Thomas Paquin of Wendell Road, earning a three-year seat on the School Committee, and James Hemingway earning a post on the Municipal Light Board.
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.
