LEVERETT — A typical homeowner could see their property tax bill go up by nearly $500 this year, even as town officials advise that fiscal discipline will be needed in fiscal 2028.
At the recommendation of the Board of Assessors, the Select Board voted Monday to set a single tax rate, which is estimated to be $16.29 per $1,000 valuation. With the average single-family home’s assessment rising to $512,000, up from $500,000, and the tax rate up from $15.70 per $1,000 valuation, the average Leverett homeowner’s bill would increase from about $7,850 to $8,340.
Board of Assessors Chairman James Staros said there will be a 6.13% increase in property taxes, even though the town is limited by the Proposition 2½ tax-cap law and saw new growth of $44,000.
“That’s not sustainable, that’s not something that can be repeated year after year,” Staros said.
The biggest worry for assessors is that, while the nearly $7.7 million that will be raised through property taxes will cover the town’s $7.3 million budget, the so-called cushion between revenues and spending is down to $280,000, less than half of the $600,000 buffer from a year ago.
That means that if spending continues as it did this year, the town won’t be able to raise enough to cover the budget without pursuing a Proposition 2½ override, Staros said.
With that in mind, the Select Board, joined by the Finance Committee, is issuing guidance that spending should not exceed 1% and the town should not add any new personnel.
Finance Committee Chairman Phil Carter noted that, this year, the operating budget grew by 4.4%, below the 6.13% property tax increase.
“We’re getting in danger of getting to zero on that levy-limit cushion,” Carter said. He added that the cushion helped the town when there was a significant spike in health insurance costs from Hampshire County Group Health Insurance Trust in 2025 and the assessment for the Amherst-Pelham Regional schools.
“The bottom line is we’ve got to do a better job of restraining spending,” Carter said.
Select Board member Tom Hankinson said he is confident department heads will be able to abide by the 1% increase. “I think we have to make the difficult decision here, but they’ll manage it,” Hankinson said.
Select Board Chairman Patricia Duffy said the 1% spending requirement shows the severity of the situation the town is facing.
But Finance Committee member Geoff Allen noted that the cap on spending is below both the rate of inflation and cost-of-living adjustments.
Finance Committee member Nancy Grossman said officials need to ensure that departments aren’t expanding programs as they did this year, when the Council on Aging expanded its outreach worker’s hours, and the library added hours as well.
In other business, the Select Board:
- appointed Eva Gibavic of Rattlesnake Road to conduct the required perambulation of Leverett’s boundaries, walking to various sites and ensuring markers are in place. This work, Gibavic said, which is supposed to be done every five years, was last done regularly by former Select Board member Alice Rarig in the 1990s. Gibavic said she knows of one marker, a stone on Route 63 at the Sunderland town line, that has been split into three pieces and needs to be restored;
- set May 1, 2027, as the date for annual Town Meeting;
- agreed to discuss three proposals for reuse of the Field Building, the former town library at 1 Shutesbury Road, at its meeting at Town Hall on Nov. 17 at 7 p.m.
