WESTHAMPTON — Significant service cuts could be on the horizon at Hampshire Regional as the district grapples with a $2 million increase in level-service costs, driven largely by soaring health insurance premiums.
Superintendent Vito Perrone warned this week that falling below level-service funding won’t just hurt current students — it could make the district “less desirable,” potentially driving families to choice out and further straining the regional budget.
During a Feb. 9 meeting that lasted more than three hours, the Hampshire Regional School Committee approved a preliminary budget of about $19.7 million for fiscal 2027 — a $400,000 shortfall from what it would take to maintain the level services. Member towns, some of whom face their own tough budget seasons, were asked to weigh how much can be sacrificed from their budgets to help the school close that gap.
Representatives from each town — Southampton, Westhampton, Chesterfield, Goshen and Williamsburg — who serve on their town’s elementary school committees approved the preliminary budget after first considering three other options.
Along with representatives, town officials like Tad Weiss of Westhampton also spoke.
“It’s heartbreaking for me to challenge the committee and the administration to take money out of this budget, but I’m just telling you the bare facts in Westhampton,” said Weiss, who chairs the town’s Finance Committee. “We cannot do it without something coming from the schools.”
Weiss was one of many town officials and representatives who gave similar sentiments. That being, they hate to see schools getting hit this year, but they also need to keep their town’s best interest at heart.
The current year’s budget sits at about $18.1 million. To maintain current services, the school would need a budget of about $20.1 million — a roughly $2 million increase.
“I really value the way that Vito and the leadership team values these programs,” said HRHS Teacher Greg Reynolds. “I hope that somebody else will speak to the value of the programs here, but yeah, this is just devastating.”
Of the three students that spoke during the meeting, one said she will be studying graphic arts design in college next year. Having seen previous cuts to art programming at the school — a large part of her education — she is worried for her younger peers.
“If I can convey anything tonight, I hope you understand how important we feel that our students are and that we are meeting their needs,” Perrone said. “Because what happens here at Hampshire Regional is special.”
Perrone, along with Hampshire Regional Business Administrator Dawn Scaparotti and Principal Lauren Hotz, opened the meeting by giving a presentation on the current HRHS services, the preliminary budget and several options to towns. They emphasized that the current goal is to avoid eliminating any full-time employees and to keep cuts as far away from the classroom as possible.
Hampshire Regional must have their final budget approved by March 21.
In an interview with the Gazette, Perrone noted that while no cuts are finalized in the preliminary budget, he finds it unlikely the district can avoid eliminating full-time positions.
“When you start looking at hundreds of thousands of dollars below level-service budgets you start looking at negative effects to students services,” Perrone said. “Negative effects to the school and it’s going to hurt us by making us less desirable for choice in and it’s going to open the door for choice out.”
To bridge the gap to level services, the towns would have to contribute significantly more than they did for the current year — a 9.3% increase, or approximately $1 million.
Chesterfield would have to contribute 30% more than it did for the current year, Williamsburg 13%, Southampton 8%, Westhampton 6% and Goshen 2%. Perrone explained the amount each town contributes to HRHS is assessed by the state through a complex system, based on many factors such as student enrollment, each town’s own revenue and more.
Hotz showed a slide that listed the cuts that would be made if the towns only increased their contributions by 4.03%, less than they would for the preliminary budget. It would result in roughly six full-time employees cut that would impact a wide range of services, and other services such as after-school buses, summer credit recovery courses and JV sports would be lost.
Hotz said the district has faced previous staff reductions in the past several years, which resulted in the most savings compared to other cuts. Since fiscal year 2024, the district has cut two interventionists, a math, art and wellness teacher, a librarian and reduced a full-time employee’s hours.
Towns weigh in
Representatives from several towns weighed in on the issue.
“This will be a hard budget for us, no doubt. I would have to say we’d love to support the levels of this budget, but it’s probably going to be very difficult,” said Chesterfield Finance Committee member Lee Manchester, about the level-services budget. “We could try for an override, but we haven’t done an override in Chesterfield in many years and I doubt frankly that it would pass.”
Manchester and Weiss both discussed the possibility of an override for their respective towns. Weiss said it is likely that Westhampton will attempt an override, but that might not even cover their own town services they need to consider.
Goshen Select Board and Finance Committee member Kristine Bissell echoed Manchester’s comments. While Goshen may have smaller assessed increases than Chesterfield necessary for level services, they are experiencing many of the same issues.
“We’re dealing with the same things that the town of Chesterfield is dealing with,” Bissell said. “We want to support the schools as much as we can, but it will also be difficult for us as well.”
Bissell said with a smaller assessed increase than Chesterfield, with Goshen’s tax revenue, she doesn’t know how much the town will be able to contribute.
After the meeting, Perrone acknowledged that, “everyone’s in a tough place and we understand that the towns are in a tough place, but we have a responsibility to meet the needs of our students … how we reconcile those things is really what the School Committee did last night.”
Acknowledging that health insurance premium hikes have put every town in a similar financial bind, Perrone encouraged stakeholders to continue the productive deliberation that began on Feb. 9 to find the best path forward.
Of the roughly $2 million increase needed to maintain level services, 55% of the hike consists of staff benefit increases and 26% is special education tuition, services and transportation. Perrone said the staff benefits increase mainly comes from a hike in health insurance premiums, as part of the Hampshire County Group Insurance Trust (HCGIT).
Scaparotti said thankfully, revenues are projected to increase as well. There is projected to be an approximately $1 million increase in revenues mainly due to increased state aid due to school choice tuition raises and grants, and reimbursement offsets.
Perrone said since being hired a year and a half ago and assembling his team, they have been trying to follow a logical process to support the schools and implement a strategic plan.
Between now and the final budget approval in March, Perrone said the central office of the school district is going to work to find any additional revenues and help the other schools in the district to set their budgets.
In the Hampshire Regional School District, according to state law and guidelines, once the high school’s budget is set then the New Hingham Regional Elementary school’s budget is made, followed by the individual town elementary schools.
“Seventeen years ago, I purposely chose [to live in] Westhampton because of Westhampton Elementary School and Hampshire Regional High School for the programs that they offer to children, to our students, to my students, [to] my children,” Perrone said at the meeting. “And I don’t want to do anything to change that for the kids that are here now and the kids that are going to be here in the future. That’s how important this meeting is.”