MATTAPOISETT – The Mattapoisett Finance Committee voted against this year’s school budget, citing concerns about the cost of the elementary schools compared to the high school, administration salary raises and whether there is a need for two elementary schools.

The discussion will continue at this year’s town meeting. 

Four members voted against and three voted to support the budget at the April 21 Finance Committee meeting.

Finance Committee Chair Patricia Donoghue cited her main concern was the local school budget, which encompasses funding for The Center School and Old Hammondtown Elementary.

The Mattapoisett School Committee presented a budget of $7,535,000, which represents an 1.3% increase over current spending. The budget does not include anything paid for by grants or the state.

However, Donoghue says that the committee’s concerns center around the increased cost per pupil. She says this number is more indicative of the problem, because it includes other costs like capital expenditures that aren’t included in the budget.

She added that this is also the best way to compare Mattapoisett’s spending to other schools, because every school has to calculate the cost per pupil number the same way.

Since 2008, “Our cost per pupil has gone up 62%, but at the high school, it has only gone up 26%,” she said. Donoghue said that when she brought up these concerns at a school committee meeting, she was told that elementary schools are “significantly more expensive than high schools.”

So, Donoghue did her research.

“I got some more information from the state,” she said. “And as a general rule, high school is not less expensive.”

Donoghue said that she discovered that the Massachusetts budget recommendation suggests the cost per pupil for high school students be 11% more than elementary school students.

“That’s a 47% gap between what the state recommends and what we’re doing.”

Donoghue said that her concern was that she keeps “getting excuses” like this from the school committee, but when she does research, she discovers that they are “not actually valid.”

More assistance from the school board would be needed, Donoghue said, to understand the reason for these costs.

“As a result, I would like to officially say I would vote no on the school budget,” she said at the April 21 Finance Committee meeting, “until such time we would officially have a plan or an agreement’’ that can be reviewed.

“The school budget just doesn’t make sense to me, so I can’t support it the way it is.”

Select Board Chair Jordan Collyer said that he and Town Administrator Mike Lorenco recently met with Superintendent Mike Nelson and Assistant Superintendent of Finance and Operations Howie Barber about these issues.

“At the end of the day, Mike [Nelson] understands where we’re coming from,” said Collyer. He stated that they agreed to have a “more granular discussion” soon.

“It’s one thing to put up the numbers, but to understand where the money is going to, sometimes that’s ambiguous based on how they allocate, so we’re going to sit down and dig into the details.”

“The transparency of school budgets is a concern to me,” said Lorenco. “There’s high administration raises that were not explained to me.”

Donoghue agreed, citing a 7.6% raise for Nelson and a 6.6% raise for Barber.

“I’m losing sleep over this,” Donoghue said. “It just doesn’t seem right.”

Nelson stated in an email that he was disappointed to hear that the Finance Committee did not support the proposed school budget.

“The school committee approved a programmatically and fiscally responsible budget that meets the needs of all Mattapoisett students. We hope the voters understand how important it is to approve the school budget as it is proposed at the upcoming town meeting - in order to support our current students’ learning needs,” he wrote.

“The school committee and school administration has worked collaboratively with the Finance Committee, Select Board, and the Town Administrator throughout the budget development process and will continue to do so.”

Collyer pointed out that these per pupil costs are compounded by the fact that there are two separate buildings for the elementary school, leading to duplicate costs.

Donoghue said that a reason for these two buildings is that in 2002, they believed the school population would grow, but instead it has fallen by 36 percent.

“Financially, it’s not sustainable,” said Lorenco, noting that there are several empty classrooms in the buildings. “We can continue to fund it if that’s what taxpayers want, but we’re going to have to do an override pretty shortly.”

An “override” of the tax-limiting Proposition 2-1/2, could raise taxes to pay for a larger budget but would have to be approved by Town Meeting and a town-wide referendum.

Lorenco noted that when school consolidation is discussed, it is “only from the town’s side,” and not something the school board has addressed.

“I understand your position,” said Select Board member Tyler Macallister when Donoghue attended the Select Board meeting. “But people have to come to Town Meeting to support that decision. Without that support, it’s just the four of us talking at the table here.”

The Finance Committee's vote sets up a potential showdown at Town Meeting where several things can happen.

If Town Meeting voters take the committee's recommendation and vote against the school budget, school officials and the School Committee would have to go back to the drawing board to come up with a lesser budget number to present to a special Town Meeting.

Or the committee could recommend that Town Meeting approve a reduced school budget. If that lesser budget passed, it would leave school officials to decide what to cut to live within that reduced budget.

Lorenco said either option would be messy.

“I don’t disagree if you want to vote no recommendation on [the budget],” Lorenco addressed the committee during the vote. “I just don’t agree with changing the number on the town meeting floor. I don’t think it’ll accomplish what you want it to accomplish.”

He stated that he doesn’t think this year is “the year to do it,” and suggested that the committee bring it up at the meeting, give the school board time to address the concerns, and say next year, “we want answers.”

Ultimately, the decision will be up to the voters.

Mattapoisett’s town meeting will be on May 9 at 6:30pm in the Old Rochester Regional School auditorium.