The Halifax Board of Selectmen met Tuesday, April 23.
Conservation Commission Appointment
They met with Alan Dias to consider his appointment to the Conservation Committee. They had a letter from the Commission saying that the Commission voted 2-1 with one abstention to recommend Dias. Dias, who has been a Halifax resident for 46 years said, “I have watched the Conservation Commission meetings for the last year or so and the Commission is a very important function of the town, and it is kind of missing what I think it really needs – some experience. You’ve got new members, you’ve got members leaving, you’ve got new members starting and I think that with my experience, I’ve been a contractor for 35 years, I’ve represented clients on this side of the table for Conservation Commission meetings.” He continued, “I’m familiar with the Wetlands Protection Act, I’m familiar with the stormwater management, the sanitation code and I think I can assist the Board with trying to get itself reorganized so that it functions as a good Board and it’s not just handling complaints.” He said his goal was to be on the Board for about a year.
Selectmen Chair John Bruno read from a letter urging that Dias not be appointed to the Commission due to alleged violations at his 0 Pine St. North property. The letter said, “He’s also currently personally engaged with the Water Department on a proposed construction development within priority habitat and which there’s no current approved site plan. Additionally, Mr. Dias owns many acres of wetlands in and around East Monponsett. Though I have no doubt that Mr. Dias is a very intelligent and hardworking man, it is my personal opinion that he has too many conflicts of interest to appropriately and fairly serve on the Halifax Conservation Commission.” Dias responded alluding to the letter being written by resident Jeremy Gillespie, who was in attendance. He said, “Mr. Gillespie’s violations; they’ve been well vetted; they’ve been vetted by DEP [Department of Environmental Protection]. Quite frankly, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.” Dias said that if he had a financial interest in a matter he would recuse himself. Commission member Edward Lane spoke out in favor of Dias’ appointment. Gillespie spoke up claiming that Lane had lied about an important site visit.
Selectman Jonathan Selig spoke on Dias saying, “This has been one of the hardest decisions I’ve had to make since being a Selectman. Alan, I want to thank you for your service to the town. You’ve done decades worth of service. I know his integrity is being questioned; I don’t have questions with his integrity. I don’t have questions that he’s a hard-working good citizen of Halifax. But I do think, for better or worse, it’s gotten to be a little bit political… and I know we as a town are trying to move past that a little bit, so again, very, very hard decision for me, but I don’t think that I can go for your approval just based on recent political things and it pains me, because I think you’re a very, very knowledgeable guy.” Dias responded, “My political views won’t make a difference from looking at regulations… we have regulations, we read those, we interpret them, we make our decision.”
Selectman Naja Nessralla spoke out in favor of appointing Dias. Amy Troup spoke out against Dias accusing him of telling her boss that she was a racist while they were serving on the Planning Board together. She referred to serving with him as a “nightmare.” Bruno said that similar issues were brought up when appointing Dias to the Bylaw Review Committee but said that he did a great job despite those concerns. “Personally, I know Alan. I’ve known him for as long as I’ve been in town, and I knew his parents. His father was the first Grand Knight at our church… so I’ve known them pretty well. I know all of his work. I know he’s had issues all up and down and so haven’t we all, so I’m not really concerned about that,” Bruno said. Bruno made a motion to appoint Dias which was met with ire from both Troup and Gillespie. Dias was appointed to the Commission with a 2-1 vote with both Bruno and Nessralla voting in favor and Selig voting against.
Building Department Fee Changes
“The Finance Committee had asked that all departments annually review their fee schedules just to make sure that we’re in line with our comparable communities; we’re obviously not looking to charge more but we want to continuously review those to make sure that they are in line with where they need to be,” Town Administrator Cody Haddad said. New Building Commissioner Ed Bayly reviewed ten surrounding communities and made recommendations for fee changes to be brought before the Board of Selectmen for their review and approval. Bayly said that upon review Halifax was at the lower end of average. His proposed changes moved them closer to the upper end of average. The Selectmen approved the new fee schedule effective July 1.
Pole and Road Cut Approvals
The Selectmen had a scheduled pole hearing that evening for the purpose of hearing the joint petition submitted by Massachusetts Electric Company and Verizon New England Inc. to replace some existing poles on Holmes St. A representative from National Grid appeared before the Board explaining that the change would reduce the number of people who lose power should something happen causing a power outage. The Selectmen agreed to the work.
The Selectmen also had a request from Eversource to open a 4’x6’ road cut at 98 Holmes St. for an abandoned gas service line. “The stipulation is it has to be approved by the Conservation Commission,” Bruno said. The Building Inspector, Police, and Highway have already approved. The Selectmen voted to also approve it pending the Conservation Commission’s approval. They dealt with two more road cuts to install new gas service at 203 Oak St. The Selectmen voted to approve those as well contingent on the other necessary department approvals.
Other Business
Haddad told the Selectmen that they are undergoing upgrades to their water treatment facilities. He said that the engineering firm that is serving as the project manager has submitted a change of scope that will result in an increased cost of $31,600. Haddad noted that they do have the funding in place. The Selectmen voted to approve the changes. The total cost of the project will be just under $3 million.
The Selectmen also reviewed a contract with Ocean State Pyrotechnics for the fireworks display scheduled for June 29 with a rain date of June 30. “This is all with donated funds,” Haddad said. The Selectmen agreed to the contract.
The Selectmen also dealt with expanding the newly formed Alewife Restoration Committee from three to four members. Standing member Jeremy Gillespie was there to speak to the need to expand the Committee. The Selectmen agreed to change the makeup of the Committee to up to five members. They also voted to approve the appointment of Allen Palmer to the Alewife Restoration Committee.
Haddad provided an update saying that they officially launched their community forum HaliFACTS. “It’s been a good service; we’ve received one or two comments so far and we’ve been pretty quick to respond to them. We really want to emphasize people to utilize that rather than social media so they can get the accurate information,” he explained. Haddad also said that he and Selig filmed a Town Meeting warrant preview which is posted online at Area 58. In the video, they go through each article explaining a bit more about them.

The Plympton Board of Selectmen met on Monday, April 22. Town Administrator Elizabeth Dennehy reviewed all of the various articles on the town meeting warrant asking the Selectmen to put a hold on anything they wanted to discuss further. Articles include Article 6 that is the Community Preservation funding for the restoration of the historic front entrance of Plympton’s Townhouse. Article 9 seeks to appropriate $4,042 plus repurposing an additional $3,500 for the required 5 percent match for an anticipated award of an Assistance to Firefighters Grant (AFG) grant for communications equipment for the Fire Department.
Article 33 “allows the Town Clerk to make a new section using e-code and it makes it a requirement for people to have a house number somewhere visible so the Fire Department can identify,” Dennehy explained. Selectman John Traynor asked what was driving it and Dennehy said that the By-Law Review Committee has been reaching out to different town departments to get their feedback and this suggestion came from the Fire Department. “I don’t know how enforceable it will be but I think it’s a good start at least for new construction,” Dennehy said.
Dennehy told the Selectmen that the Finance Committee no longer wants to mail the warrants out to residents. “They think it’s an additional cost and it’s not sustainable and we have hardcopies available at Town Meeting… we’re avoiding the bulk mail permit expense and it will be on the website and on social media,” Dennehy said. Selectman Mark Russo was surprised the decision was made for this year. “I think this is the thing to alert citizens that maybe wouldn’t look anywhere else,” he explained. Traynor said he was in favor of forgoing the mailing due to it being a “fairly large expense.” Russo elaborated on his point saying, “the trouble is you have to have your interest piqued to access it anywhere and unless it goes out in the mail there’ s a whole bunch of people that this will go right over their heads; honestly I kind of feel like it’s a connection with the past and a traditional thing… it’s also kind of a manifestation of our work and what we do.” Dennehey said that she would bring Russo’s concerns to the Finance Committee.
Dennehy also reviewed the articles for the Special Town Meeting. The second article is for a Community Preservation project at Holt Field including lighting. Dennehy said they may be able to pass over Articles 3 and 4. Article 5 is for the projected deficit at Dennett Elementary School. Dennehy said that School Committee Chair Jason Fraser and the rest of the Committee are working hard to reduce that deficit as much as possible. Traynor asked how much the School Committee was anticipating the deficit to be and was told that as of that date, it was likely around $130,000 though that number was anticipated to go down.
Dennehy provided a Town Administrator’s update saying, “our vendor is putting the finishing touches on a Green Communities application; the deadline for applying is May 10… I believe we’re going to try again for the library heating system.”
They ended their meeting with their raves for the week. Selectman Chair Christine Joy said, “My rave would be for Liz and the financial team and all the hard work that goes into creating the warrant and vetting all the articles and coming up with funding sources, and transferring money; it’s a huge process and you do a wonderful job and we’re lucky to have you.” Russo said, “I totally agree with that; it’s not just the finished product this year but the process that’s been put in place.”

Chair John Bruno said that he received a letter from the Chair of the Hanson Select Board regarding regionalization of pond management as well as whether the Plymouth County Commissioners could take a role in said management. He read from the letter saying, “Currently each town has its own pond management plan and allocates funds for this purpose; we believe there may be scales of economy and thus savings if we ban together in solving this problem. We recognize that the Conservation Commission in each town would have to be part of the conversation as will the Select Boards in each town. My reason for reaching out is to gauge whether your town would be interested in opening up a dialogue with Plymouth County Commissioners.” Bruno said they weren’t looking for a commitment just yet and said he believed it was a great idea. “Yea, I view it as a strength in numbers thing,” Selectman Jonathan Selig said. Town Administrator Cody Haddad said that it came about because the County is looking to provide more services to its member communities.
Special and Annual Town Meeting Warrant
Regarding the Warrant, Haddad said, “One of the changes to note is we have historically always included the line-item budgets for the school department – Silver Lake and the elementary school; they don’t have line- item budgets so hence we cannot include those in the warrant this year.” He noted that the goal would be to have them in the next few weeks and have them available on the website as well as having them printed to give out at Town Meeting. Haddad went over each article including Article 7 which is the potential approval of the solar pilot on River St. “This is one our Assessor and Counsel are still working to fully negotiate that solar pilot. If we do not have that in the next week or so… we will just skip over.” Article 9 is the Community Preservation Act which Haddad said the Selectmen would need to decide whether to do a 1 percent surcharge or something different. “I know we’re fiscally at a tight spot right now, but I do feel like if we came in at a 1.5 percent that might be more beneficial,” Selig said. The other Selectmen agreed.
Haddad said that Article 15 is an additional $25,000 to fund an HVAC unit at the high school. He explained that $100,000 had previously been approved at Town Meeting but the project was delayed and the cost is anticipated to have risen. Haddad explained that the other towns are funding their portion through American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds while Halifax is paying for it out of stabilization.
Haddad said that there was a placeholder article for Special Town Meeting. The schools are anticipating a deficit in their special education line item and they don’t yet know to what exent. “They seem to think that they are going to be able to cover the deficit with their other line items in the budget; they’ve implemented a spending freeze but they do not have that information ready so we wanted to put a placeholder article in case we do have to fund that deficit to some extent… just in case,” he explained. The Selectmen voted to approve the warrant.
Delegation of Educational Funding
Haddad said that this topic was requested by Selig. “I noticed with our education budgeting process this year, it felt challenging. To me it felt like a lot of the challenges weren’t necessarily on the municipal side but more on a lack of support at the State level so I felt like it was worth us to send letters to the State House leadership just to convey how frustrating the process is where we’re seeing these giant spikes in special education costs, but the State isn’t really meeting those costs for us so what we’re seeing happening is… general education students are often feeling the crunch,” he explained. He shared a draft of the letter he wrote with his fellow Selectmen. The Board agreed to send the letter.
Request to Raise Boards at Furnace St. culvert
Haddad told the Selectmen that he was contacted by Brad Chase with the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries. He said that himself, Highway Surveyor Steve Hayward, and Board of Health Agent Bob Valery met with a few individuals from the State to discuss the town’s priority to get the herring back to Monponsett. Haddad said that Chase felt that raising the Boards at the Furnace St. Culvert would assist in allowing the herring to flow through. Chase is also requesting that Halifax supports moving forward with a study on the hydraulogy, hydraulics, and conditions and operations of the Furnace St. and Elm St. culverts. Jeremy Gillespie spoke up regarding the boards saying, “they’re just slowing down the waterflow, backing it up, they’re creating eutrophic conditions in the river; it is a river that flows out of Monponsett… this needs to be done pretty quick… once the water reaches 50 degrees we’re going to see the herring come up.”
Appointments
Heather Sylvia of the Tipsy Mermaid appeared before the Board to request a one day liquor license for The Farm at Raven Brook. The event will take place on May 12 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. where mocktails and wine will be served. Tami Herchel also appeared before the Board to request use of the town’s roadways for the Ragnar Road New England Race. The event starts in Connecticut and ends in Quincy. The race will come through Halifax on May 17-18. Selig pointed out that the runners will be stopping in Halifax during the late hours of the night to the early morning hours. “You won’t even know we’re here,” Herchel said. The Selectmen approved the race coming through the town unanimously.
Inter Municipal Agreement with Duxbury Regarding Dispatch Services
The Selectmen voted to agree to a one year contract with Duxbury at a cost of $200,000. Haddad said that they do anticipate another municipality joining thus lowering the fee after this year.
Morse Brothers Update
Haddad told the Selectmen that the Morse Brothers had finished all work under their existing earth removal permit. He said that they would need to appear before the Board again for any further work. Bruno said that for the most part the few complaints that they had were with respect to the trucks moving too slowly. “As far as I can tell, it went smoothly,” Bruno said. There was one incident with a special education bus that was easily resolved as well. Amy Troup spoke up insisting that the Board also received “plenty of complaints” regarding the earth removal being in the aquifer protection zone. “So put it on record that there were actual complaints… our water is not the same anymore,” she said.
Town Administrator Updates
Haddad told the Selectmen that they would be bringing forth an applicant for the Town Accountant position after several successful interviews. He also told them that Halifacts was now live saying that he hoped residents would go there for information rather than believing hearsay on social media. More information can be found at https://www.halifax-ma.org/home/news/halifacts-halifaxs-online-community-forum.

Silver Lake Regional School Committee met Tuesday, April 9, at the regional high school in Kingston.
High on the list of items discussed was the budget, and making it work, despite current challenges. Paula Hatch, chairman, explained that Silver Lake isn’t the only school district in the state faced with these extraordinary challenges; it is happening throughout the state. Hatch referenced an article in the Boston Globe that detailed new accounting requirements.
Began with a School Choice hearing. Superintendent Dr. Jill Proulx explained that school choice would allow students from other school districts to pay tuition to attend Silver Lake schools. Silver Lake has opted not to participate in school choice at this time. Committee member Jason Fraser made a motion to opt out of school choice and gave current classroom sizes and budgetary concerns as reasons for doing so. The motion was seconded and the vote unanimous to decline participation in school choice.
Carl Pike, a longtime member of the Kingston Finance Committee, addressed the assembly saying despite his being a prime supporter of the schools, the current education increase that Kingston is looking at is $2.9 million, or a 10.3% increase over last year. That’s on top of a 7% increase and 1.9 million for last year. “Well, any of you that know anything about finances, budgets, Proposition 2 ½, you cannot live with 7% and 10% increases every year… Despite that, we’re continuing to work to find some way of justifying it.” Pike went on to say that he took an informal vote at the last finance committee meeting and said that he feared his committee will not be able to recommend this kind of increase in the budget.
Pike closed his comments with an invitation to all present to attend the next Finance Committee meeting on April 17 to comment on whatever they think is right. “Rest assured, that the town administration in Kingston, the Board of Selectmen in Kingston, the Finance Committee in Kingston, intends to continue to support the schools, the education, the administrators, the teachers, that everybody that we can within reasonable budget limitations to provide the best education that we can for the residents and their children of the Town of Kingston.”
Superintendent Jill Proulx introduced Silver Lake District Business Director Sarah Hickey who reported to the Silver Lake Regional School Committee on Budget Version VI, incorporating many of the proposed reductions discussed at prior meetings to bring the budget into line with funds available.
Budget Version VI, showed a total Silver Lake Budget of $40,624,059, with a reduction of $855,000 as voted by the Silver Lake school committee at their March 22 meeting. As a result of that vote to reduce the budget, Hickey updated the assessments to all towns, including the revenue that was counted toward the assessments with the following result: Halifax at its April 1 meeting voted for FY25 is $6,965,138. Kingston voted $14,568,739 at its April 2 meeting, and Plympton voted $3,975,000 at its March 25 meeting.
The total cost of education for Halifax in FY25 is $15,580,356, representing a 4.9% increase over FY24. For Kingston, it is $31,312,851, a 10.6% increase over FY24. For Plympton, the total cost of education for FY25 is $7,279,885, a 6.8% increase over FY24. The total cost of education in the three towns is $54,173,093, or an 8.4% overall increase.
Silver Lake District Tier I proposed reductions in transportation and technology:
Reduce Late Bus by one day, savings $11,732; reduce Pre-K technology by $1500, Middle School Technology by $29,920, and High School Technology by $36,190. Subtotal $79,342 savings.
Tier II reductions include $5,700 PreK Technology, $17,500 in Middle School Technology, $15,000 in cuts to High School Technology, approx $40,000 in retirement savings due to two retirements and a proposal to move the food service director to the revolving account for a $98,715 reduction, so the Tier I reductions total $176,915 and Tier II reductions equal $256,257.
Silver Lake integrated pre-school reductions of $2,500 in supplies and dues and a reduction of $229,950 for out-of-district tuition. Tier II would be a staffing decrease of one full-time equivalent position of $65,000 so the Tier I reduction of $232,450 and Tier II reduction of $65,000 gives a total of $297,450. The integrated pre-school proposal reduction of one teacher has no impact on teaching and learning, according to administration. The IEP teams will use a data-driven process supplied by student evaluations and progress monitoring systems to determine the just right service level of each student. The model uses a four-day-a- week half-day preschool program model. Hickey went on to say that this approach will increase available seats for students with disabilities in the integrated preschool program.
Plympton’s representative to the committee Jason Fraser asked, “Did we find a way to do this without laying off anyone?” Through attrition and various commodities cuts, with the whole package of cuts, Superintendent Proulx answered “Yes, that is the intent.”
High school principal Michaela Gill reviewed her school’s budget and was able to come up with $151,600 in cuts without staff reduction; the biggest cuts were in supplies, new equipment replacement, and athletics. She noted that the largest share of supplies came from consumables in the Art and Science programs. She also noted that she was looking to make two FTE cuts. “Although we are absorbing them through attrition, they are currently vacant positions due to resignations or retirements.” Not filling those positions moving forward will still have an impact on student learning and a small impact on teaching stipends filled by teachers for extra-curricular programs.
Becky Couet, Middle School Principal, detailed budget cuts to her school with Tier 1 cuts totaling $81,943 coming from supplies, curriculum, and technology. Tier II cuts – staffing – brought one FTE unit saving $65,000. Total Tier I and Tier II proposed reductions of $146,943. Couet explained that the majority of the cuts were in supplies and consumables, new library books, art and music replenishment of some supplies, and supplementary reading resources.
From the principal’s line, dues, signage, PCIS incentives, and guest speakers all were reduced. Technology saw reduction of repair line, delay on the eFax program, no additional Adobe licenses, supplies, document cameras, reduction of Chromebook replacements, and limited docking station.
From the equipment line, conference tables and furniture all took a reduction as well as a flip-form riser for the music department. PD saw a 50% decrease in PD conference opportunities for all staff. Under Other, additional guest speakers, piano tuning, and transportation or interscholastic sports were reduced.
The total savings for Tier 1 are $545,318. Tier II Savings are $461,315.
Chairman Hatch noted that as the principals were enumerating their budget cuts they also said they could do without these things “next year”, meaning we should expect to see them back in the budget requests the following year.
Committee member Fraser pointed out that there would be circuit breaker funds flowing into the district next year. “We’re going to have to be very careful as to how we replace the items we’re cutting this year, but I see the ability for us to restore most, if not all of what we’re cutting this year, once we have circuit breaker next year.” Stating that it doesn’t necessarily mean that the schools replace exactly what’s on the cut list because “we need to take into account some of the areas of dire need that we’ve all been witness to over the past several years. “ Fraser predicted that while Silver Lake High School will be in a much better place next year, the town school committees will face serious challenges as their circuit breaker money runs out. He described a bounceback budget situation between the Lake and the locals. He explained that committees will need to work together as a whole to assess the total cost of education.
Hatch said she encourages everyone to attend town meetings to support their schools and the budget. “We don’t want to make cuts. We’ll make the smartest decisions we possibly can with all the factors that we have.”

The Kingston School Committee met on Tuesday, April 2. It was a packed house with even more attendees joining the meeting virtually.
The Committee opened the meeting to anyone from the public wishing to speak. Carl Pike, who serves on the Finance Committee and is a retired town treasurer, spoke on behalf of the town. Pike said that he has been a huge supporter of the schools and their budgets for years. “We have always, since I’ve been involved, tried to be very conservative in our financial management. We’ve tried to service the various functions of the various departments – the schools – while at the same time thinking about the residents, the annual tax bills, etc… Proposition 2 ½ says that we are able to tax our residents an increase of 2 ½ percent every year. We always hope to get some new growth… so that gives us another percent, so we try to keep the budget increases each year to about 3 ½ percent,” Pike said. He went on to say that the initial goal was to keep each department around a 3 ½ percent increase and noted that most came in under 5 percent. He continued saying that the schools’ budget came in around 15 percent. “We didn’t feel that we could come anywhere near providing 15 percent increase and being fair to other departments, other functions, and to the taxpayers.”
Pike said that after working with the schools, the current increase stands around 11 percent which would result in somewhere around a $400 increase to home property taxes. “In order to balance everything out across the towns, I encourage the School Committee, the School Administration, to work to find some solutions where we continue to provide the education we all want to provide but we find ways to make the numbers balance better. And I assure the parents that are sitting here, there is no one in town government that wants to sacrifice education… we all recognize that education in almost every community in Massachusetts is going to be 50 percent of the town budget,” Pike said.
Former School Committee member of 15 years and current Selectman Eric Crone also addressed the crowd. “One of the issues, obviously, when you’re making cuts, you’re making cuts potentially to programs, making class sizes bigger, or making it less desirable for families to send their kids to our school district,” Crone said. He pointed out that it leaves families with few options including moving or sending their kids to private schools. He noted, however, that charter schools do take money away from the town’s schools. “When that kid leaves our district and goes to the charter school, the amount of money that we lose, the expenses don’t go down, so if we have 10 kids leave and go to the charter school, you can’t lay off a teacher,” he continued.
Another former School Committee member and current Selectman Sheila Vaughn also spoke. “Every year we have to go up and I understand that this year is exponentially harder than most years because there are a lot of changes that we somewhat knew going into it, that it was going to be tough because of the preschool going over to Silver Lake and, again, like Eric said, special education cannot be cut… so when the cuts come, they come from the regular day budget,” Vaughn said. She continued, “We have to fund special education… Kingston has actually done a very good job this year of trying to stay within the budget, but this was mandated because DESE [Department of Education and Secondary Education] needed it to come through.” She implored voters that they need to come out to Town Meeting to make sure that their voices are heard.
President of the Kingston Teacher’s Association, and a 17-year teacher at Kingston Elementary School, Heidi Fox spoke on behalf of the educators of Kingston. “We love our students; we think of them as part of our family. We take pride in providing them with rich, high-quality education and engaging learning experiences. We instill within our students a love of learning, foster the courage to follow their dreams, encourage them to think outside the box and ask questions, and teach them to collaborate and be team players,” she said. Fox continued, “We understand that we are facing financial challenges. We’re all struggling with increased costs, however, by cutting our classroom-based staff, it strips away one of the greatest resources available to these children – their teachers.” She asked them to consider “trimming at the administrative level” rather than from teachers. Her remarks were met with applause.
Superintendent Jill Proulx spoke saying, “As we build these budgets, we had a number of changes that we were required to make and in addition we have been faced with rising costs like many schools throughout the State: inflation, rising costs of out-of-district tuitions, rising costs of transportation, rising costs to everything from paper to the crayons that the kids use. It is all leading to increases in our budgets that we are finding difficult to sustain.” These increases were presented in mid-March at a joint school committee meeting. The revised budget is a result of that meeting.
Director of Finance for Silver Lake, Sarah Hickey, spoke on the revised budget. She said that an additional 240 grant application reduced the budget by $170,944 and additional Circuit Breaker funding reduced it by another $869,655. Additional changes included a reduction of $290,428 from the salary lines and a technology grant that represented a decrease of $70,000. Increases included $413,556 in additional out-of-district tuitions and transportations. There was also an insurance adjustment which represented an increase of over $100,000.
Hickey said that Kingston’s assessment represented over a $4 million increase over the previous fiscal year. The total cost of education in Kingston is $29,818,034 which represents a 5.3 percent increase over fiscal year ’24. “When you look at contractual obligations… that is not just, yes, teachers have contracts and contracts including teachers increased, contractual obligations from my point of view… is the cost for the contract to maintain the elevator in the building… contracts for copy machines and printers,” Hickey explained. “The price for contracts has gone up,” she added.
Proulx said that they would be presenting a tiered approach to budget cuts that evening. Kingston Intermediate Principal Andrew Materna and Kingston Elementary School Principal Kerri Whipple spoke regarding cuts. They said that the first place they looked to make cuts was from supplies and other items that don’t directly affect the student experience. Whipple recommended funding an ELL teacher position from an E.S. fund (emergency shelter funding). Staff cuts include 6 paraprofessionals and 2.9 full-time unit A staff, likely including classroom teachers. Whipple said that despite the cuts, classroom sizes would remain under 30.
Like Whipple, Materna went through the tiered cuts beginning with supplies and materials and moving into staff cuts in Tier 3. If classroom teachers were cut, most class sizes would increase an average of 4 students.
School Committee member Jeanne Coleman said, “I would be comfortable bringing a budget to Town Meeting without any staff cuts and allowing the public to be able to support the staff; I’ve heard from not one person in town that has asked us to cut staff.” She advocated that everyone there that evening show up to Town Meeting to support the budget. Chair Timothy Lewis said he felt that additional cuts could be made to lines such as legal and substitute. “I believe there is other money in this budget we can save,” he told everyone. Coleman made a motion that they approve the revised budget without tier 3 staff cuts. The approved cuts in tiers 1 and 2 represented around $388,000. Lewis said he felt that they should be cutting more than that amount in order to be a good partner with the town.
Coleman noted that many people moved to Kingston for the good school system and that they wanted to be careful not to make cuts that would drastically affect the schools. Coleman also said that they recently did an audit on the central office which found that they were four employees short. “Not only are these administrators doing the work for our district, for Kingston specifically, they are also doing the work for Plympton, Halifax, and Silver Lake… they’re basically working around the clock and we’re already understaffed as it is,” she said.
Someone asked what would trigger a potential teacher cut in the middle of the year. Proulx said, “If we didn’t think we could absorb the areas where we had overspent through other line items, we would need to make a decision. With the budget freeze, sometimes we can’t make up some of those differences… it may or may not be likely which can sometimes trigger the School Committee to consider something like that.” Asked if that had ever happened, Proulx said she has never been a part of such a decision but she is aware it has happened in other school districts.
The motion to pass the budget with only the tier one and tier two cuts was passed with only two no votes. Coleman also made a motion to pass the Kingston School Committee budget for fiscal year ’25 at $14,568,739.78. Like the motion before, it passed 3-2.
The School Committee also held a school choice meeting. “School choice is a program in the Commonwealth where if the School Committee were to vote to approve school choice, we would be required to accept students from other communities,” Chair Timothy Lewis explained. The Committee voted unanimously not to accept school choice.
The Committee also voted to approve a grant of just over $12,000 to be used toward their nutritional program. Proulx said that it would likely be spent to replace outdated equipment.
KIS sixth grade teacher Dave Palana provided a Teacher’s Corner update. He said that the sixth grade took their first ELA MCAS that day and would take the second one the following day. Palana noted that they had the book fair for both KES and KIS. He also told the Committee that they have been trying to increase awareness of recycling through some different initiatives. Finally, Palana said that they have been working on different lessons related to the solar eclipse.
A PTO update was also provided where it was said that some modest funds would be seen from a Whitman-Hanson versus Silver Lake parent hockey game.

The Plympton School Commmittee met Monday, March 25 to discuss the school’s budget and how it pertains to the overall town budget. It was a packed audience. Chair of the School Committee Jason Fraser got things started saying, “I’ve been working very closely with town leadership since late January… for how we were going to handle the increases we were seeing toward the cost of education for our small town… our annual town budget is roughly $13 million and the increases we were seeing for education alone were north of $700,000 in increases.” Fraser continued, “In working with the town they said that they could afford approximately $400,000 in increases meaning that we would have to find a way, between Silver Lake’s budget and Dennett’s budget, to cut over $300,000.” Fraser also said that in a meeting in mid-March, Silver Lake cut approximately $155,000 from Plympton’s portion of that budget. Fraser noted that it would mean the Dennett cutting nearly $170,000 that evening which he said would “include reduction of force to staff members here at the school.”
Fraser said that around 4 p.m. that evening he was approached by the Town Administrator Liz Dennehy who offered one-time funds of $62,000. The funds are American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) revenue replacement. “It will allow us this evening not to have to make any reduction of force and keep our staff whole and complete,” Fraser told the crowd. This declaration was met with rousing applause. “There are still some areas we need to trim back the budget even with the $462,000 the town of Plympton has given us to meet the requirements of our schools to function,” he added.
Superintendent Jill Proulx and Business Director Sarah Hickey led off the budget presentation. Hickey began by outlining the changes to the Plympton budget since they last met in late February and presented the Version II budget. The first change was a REAP grant allocation to offset kindergarten tuition in the amount of $24,217. An increase of $1,103 was added due to shared cost adjustments. Version IV of the budget comes in at $4,089,098 and requires a reduction of $173,565. Hickey also said that there was a 31 percent increase in the assessment for Plympton to Silver Lake. She said that the assessment to Silver Lake plus the Dennett budget, put the total cost of education for Plympton at $7,220,419 or a 5.9 percent increase overall. Fraser noted that they would need support at Town Meeting to pass the budget.
Hickey went over some of the overall increased costs in the FY’ 25 budget including contractual obligations, health insurance, special education tuition and transportation, supplies, and utilities. She noted that contractual obligations are not limited to teachers and staff, but also include other contracted services. “We are responsible to take care of the educational well-being of all students in Plympton regardless of their needs; it’s something that this Committee has always held to both legally, but also morally,” Fraser said. He continued, “And we can see the position that it’s pushing us into with the State not really coming through with it’s side of funding to help support the towns to meet the needs of these children.”
Proulx said that the next steps would be further discussion with the towns. She noted that the Finance Committee was set to meet the following week. She went over proposed cuts including minimal ones to both Principal supply and supplies. The technology line was reduced by $15k as was the curriculum resources line. Other reductions included $14k for the sub line as well as $31,200 from a math interventionist line. The math interventionist position is not yet filled so will not result in a loss of a job. Proulx was asked for a list of items and programs that would be included in the cuts. Programs such as Reading A to Z and Typing Club were reported as proposed cuts. Fraser said that while they don’t normally take private donations for the school’s operating budget, something like that could help offset some of the cuts. Fraser said that while the School Committee doesn’t look forward to taking away any resources from the Plympton students, it does bring some relief knowing no one would be losing their job. He thanked Selectmen Chair Christine Joy, Town Administrator Elizabeth Dennehy, and Finance Committee member Marilyn Browne for working with the schools to get them the $462,000 in increases. The Committee then voted to approve the new version of the budget at $3,975,000.
Once the budget was voted, the Committee took up other business. Fraser said that he met with the Town Manager regarding dogs being allowed on the Dennett property. He said that at this time they are looking into a potential dog park and noted that there was no intent to implement a leash law in town. The town asked the Committee to continue to prohibit dogs from the Dennett property.
Fraser provided the legislative update saying, “we actually made out quite well in Plympton this year with Chapter 70 funding… we received $152,000 more this year than we received last year. One of the ways we’re funding the increases in education we’re seeing here in this town.” He went on to say that it didn’t work out that way for many other towns in the State. He noted that the State is allowing prices of private schools to go up significantly while not supporting local public schools with Chapter 70 funding. “Currently I and colleagues are asking the State of Massachusetts to increase the inflationary index from 1.25 to closer to 4.0,” Fraser said. Fraser said that the per pupil increment for Chapter 70 is currently $30 per pupil, but that it was being requested to increase that to $100 per pupil. He also said they are also asking the State to increase Circuit Breaker funding to 75 percent amongst other things.
Principal Peter Veneto provided a Principal’s Report. He said that the talent show the previous Friday evening was very successful and thanked CASA as well as all of the parent volunteers for their efforts. He noted that after 13 years with Dennett Elementary, paraprofessional Tracie Sweeney accepted a position elsewhere as an adjustment counselor. “Happy for her, very sad for us,” Veneto said. He also told the Committee about report cards, parent-teacher conferences, and the bookfair. Additionally, he said that MCAS season was beginning and said that the fifth grade had a visit from a comfort dog ahead of the exams.
While Assistant Superintendent Ryan Lynch was unable to attend, Superintendent Proulx did tell the Committee on his behalf that he had submitted a copy of the Student Opportunity Act Plan for their review and acceptance. Proulx said that every three years, districts are required to submit an updated plan to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE). “Each district is required to identify one to three evidence-based programs they are implementing to close achievement gaps,” Proulx said. A Committee member asked about a position that was being funded through Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSER). Fraser explained that ESSER funding is federal funding that exists for just one more year before expiring. Lynch’s proposal included using Student Opportunity Act funds to cover some of those expenses after the additional funding isn’t available any longer through ESSER. Proulx noted that beginning in FY’ 26 they will need to find a different funding source. After significant discussion, the Committee did vote to approve Lynch’s proposed submission with just one member abstaining from the vote.

The Plympton Board of Selectmen met in-person on Monday, March 11 with all three members present.
Selectman John Traynor said that the Board of Health issued a letter stating that the podiatry services for the Council on Aging could not be held at the Town House. “So I think we basically have to go back and have a plan B.” Director of Elder Affairs Colleen Thompson spoke on the matter saying, “I’m a little upset. It never even occurred to me that we would need to speak to the Board of Health. And in my correspondence with Liz [Dennehy] that never came up.” Thompson also said that she felt that the discussions around the services escalated quickly and said that while the Board of Health argues that she didn’t ask their permission, she was not included in the letter they sent despite it directly affecting her department. Thompson called the Board of Health’s arguments “spurious at best” and said that there is little difference between the podiatry services and the blood pressure and sugar and cholesterol checks that are done. “There’s no privacy and there’s medical waste, but we do them because it’s not really a big deal,” Thompson said. She continued saying that there is support from the nurse and noted that the doctor “has done this for years” and knows how to sanitize properly, etc. She spoke with Carver who runs a similar program about shared services, but said it is so popular that they already have a waitlist.
Thompson told the Selectmen, “I think we need to figure out a way to get the seniors more services in Plympton.” She emphasized that more thought needs to be given to how this can be done. She proposed creating a medical room to be used for medical needs. Selectmen Chair Christine Joy told Thompson that the podiatry services are not a “dead issue” saying they just need to find a place better suited to the program. Traynor said that he believes most would prefer a public space over a doctor going into homes due to safety concerns. “Let us take this back and see what we can come up with,” Joy said.
Regarding annual town meeting preparations, Town Administrator Liz Dennehy said, “At this time, we’re actively working with all of the departments on articles, budgets, all of that, so all of that is in full swing.” The annual town meeting warrant closed on the last Monday in March. Regarding budgets, Dennehy also said, “Our financial team internally, we’re all working very hard to figure out our finances going forward and how we might want to structure things and keep our debt at an even level as some of that falls off.”
As customary, the Selectmen discussed their raves for the last few weeks. “I think I have a rave though for the Financial Committee that’s been working on the Fire Station; I think you guys, which is Marilyn Browne from the Finance Committee, Kathryn Shepard, Christine Kelly [Treasurer/Collector], Elizabeth [Dennehy], Lisa Hart [Accountant]… and Jon Wilhelmsen, I think this is kind of outside their normal, everybody’s basically not getting paid, they’re volunteers so I’m very impressed with their willingness to put in time; hopefully it will pay off,” Traynor said.
Joy said that her rave was for Colleen Thompson. “I love that she feels so strongly about this (foot services) that she doesn’t want to let it go. It is an important issue. We just need to find a way to make it work in a suitable location,” Joy said. She continued, “It’s definitely a service that’s needed. If there’s waitlists for other towns than it’s something that we need to offer.”
Traynor proposed reaching out to neighboring towns. “This might be an opportunity for a shared-services grant,” Joy said. Selectman Mark Russo emphasized Joy’s rave for Thompson. His second rave was in regard to shared services saying, “I think we need to continue to always be on the lookout for shared services that might work and might model and bring forth others. I’m glad that comes up and I think that’s one of the ways out of the endless financial struggles the town has.” His final rave was for the “super raw early spring days.” He said that those days really make the later beautiful spring days “all the more wonderful.”

Silver Lake District towns were scrambling after Thursday, March 14th’s meeting with the combined Silver Lake school committees, when they learned that the budget, a “level-services” budget, was going to increase a whopping $6.7 million over last year, due largely to special education increases, including special ed transportation. The new district business manager, Sarah Hickey, presented a two-hour slide show depicting her take on the budget and her new formula for calculating the combined budget and its individual town shares.
As the initial shock subsided, representatives of all the member towns spoke up saying that even if they taxed up to their levy limit, they would not be able to meet the proposed increases, most of which are state mandated, without going back to their towns for overrides.
Jason Fraser, Plympton’s school committee representative on both the elementary and regional committees, as well as the Massachusetts Association of School Committees President-elect, was able to untangle the spaghetti lines and bring some sanity to the situation. Based on his advice, the Regional School Committee and the individual member towns voted to decrease assessments to member towns by $1,605,000 by cutting $855,000 from the budget itself and taking an additional $750,000 by drawing down the Excess and Deficiency (E&D) Fund to offset the assessments of member towns.
Fraser said that he wouldn’t ordinarily suggest using E&D revenues that are set aside to cover unexpected mid-year tuitions and services for special needs students, however this year he said, “as in FY25 we are assuming a large portion of the three towns’ Special Education cost which will make Silver Lake eligible for over $1.1 million in Circuit Breaker revenue starting in FY26. We are fortunate for the stewardship of the past and present Silver Lake School Committee members to have a fully funded and certified E&D fund.”
Significant cuts are now being considered at the local school committee level. “Kingston is looking at between $1 to $1.5 million in cuts. Halifax is considering $300,000 to $700,000 in cuts, and Plympton has proposals for $160,000 in cuts… Silver Lake did acknowledge they may need to cut further at a later meeting date but didn’t want to cut too deep before seeing what the local committees delivered”, Fraser continued. “It is common knowledge that it is far easier to amend a number down at Town Meeting than up. If the burden of cuts is shared as evenly as possible, it is likely Silver Lake will need to come back to the table for some hard conversations and possibly an even harder vote.”
Jon Wilhelmsen, who represented Plympton on the school committee for more than a decade suggests that the budget increase comes down to these items:
• A very significant increase in Special Education (SPED) costs – particularly out-of-district placements, though it would appear there are also increases to the in-district costs that contribute to very significant cost increases district-wide. “…there is literally only so much that the towns can pay to do this and as a result there will need to be cuts to the budgets in each of the three towns as well as at Silver Lake to bring this into fiscal balance.” Citing the upswing in out-of-district services as a major contributor to the cost increase, he hopes that many of these services can be brought back in-district over the next few years to mitigate the long-term impact.
• Sorting the Out-of-District setup –  The district has been set up like this for more than 20 years – and DESE (the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education) knew or should have known about it.  DESE also does regular audits of the school programs and until last year, never had any issues with the set up – but none of the prior set-up has a material impact on the $6.7m level-service budget the towns are now facing.
• A largely new central office staff – who in fairness, is learning their role but appear to have a significant issue in communicating effectively. We have spent many weeks talking through the Silver Lake budget and it was only Thursday night that it became clear that SPED costs are largely driving the increases.
“Overall,” Wilhelmsen continued, “it is disappointing to see these numbers, but if that is what they are, then we must work around them for the students, the staff, and the three towns’ residents who have to finance this. It will mean cuts in all the schools as well as increases in budgets. Hopefully this is a high point and that we will see decreases in subsequent years so that we can appropriately restore cuts. I just wish we had gotten to this understanding weeks ago.”
Former school committee member Gordon C. Andrews told The Express, “The biggest issue is 14 students at $980,000, were not factored into this year’s budget …” then an additional 30 students were added for the upcoming budget. “We should not be finding out now the causes of the budget increases, in the middle of March, that the budget is this far out.” An enormous increase has been shown since the first assessment calculation presented in February. “No one understood why the increases were so large and everyone believed it was a mistake in the reallocation of programs from the changes of the regional agreement.”
“Its been talked about – the sustainability of the town of Halifax to afford the rate of growth of Silver Lake has been an issue with the budget was growing ($1 million) year to year, with an assessment of approximately 33%.” Andrews said, “the administration and the town of Halifax should have known the impacts of the enrollment changes and the budgetary cliff that the town was facing even before the increases in special needs education. “I am worried about the students and staff at the elementary school as they will have to take the brunt of the cuts that are required due to the town not understanding the impacts of the enrollment shift at Silver Lake, which was able to be forecast and was previously planned.”
Kingston’s school committee representative said last Thursday they would consider moving their town meeting date to give their town more time to deal with the budget.
To add to the perfect storm of budgetary catastrophe is the lack of the state’s SPED reimbursement formula to accurately take into account the actual rate of inflation, according to the Boston Globe, Tuesday, March 12. According to the Globe, towns statewide are grappling with shortfalls due to the state’s new formula.

The Halifax Elementary School Committee met on Monday, March 4. Superintendent Jill Proulx presented the Version III FY’ 25 budget to the Committee. The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) mandated that Silver Lake address what they saw as long -standing structural issues in the way the regional agreement was implemented and as a result the budgets for the three elementary schools and Silver Lake look different than years’ past. Some of the changes over the previous year were that Pre-K will now be a Silver Lake expense, Silver Lake positions in the elementary schools will now become school/town employees, and out-of-district special education tuitions for Pre-K and secondary will also be Silver Lake expenses. Shared-cost positions will now be paid according to percentages in the updated regional agreement. Proulx noted that multiple legal opinions were consulted and agreed on the new agreement.
Changes from the Version II to Version III budgets include removing Pre-K out-of- district tuitions at a savings of $215,990, special education transportation adjustment at a savings of $120,934, special education tuition adjustment of minus $609, and a 240 grant allocation at a savings of $37,205.
Version III of the budget represents a regular day increase of 15 percent or $937,694. Special education tuition and transportation for Grades K through 6 represent a decrease of $2,781,192. Laws said she was concerned about the 15 percent regular day increase even if the overall budget represented a decrease. Proulx also told the Committee that there was one known retirement for FY’ 25. For out of district vocational, Proulx said there would be five placements. She said that they won’t know the exact numbers until April 1.
Regarding what was not included in the updated budget, Proulx said that potential enrollment increases, especially for kindergarten were not updated. A reduction in technology expenditures of $40,571 was not yet reflected. The reduction will be courtesy of a REAP grant.
Proulx also shared with the Committee a draft of the assessments for each of the three towns. Halifax’s share of the assessment in FY’ 24 was $5,582,257 and the FY’ 25 share is $8,918,067. The decrease, however, for Halifax Elementary School in the town’s operating budget is nearly 20 percent. The overall cost to Halifax for education, including Silver Lake regional, is a 10 percent increase. The cost of education to Halifax in FY’24 was $14,858,409 and the cost for FY’ 25 will be $16,350,721.
Proposed costs added to the current version of the budget include a special education teacher at a cost of $65,000, a part-time ESL teacher at a cost of $32,000, and a building substitute at no additional cost. Capital needs for FY’ 25 include water testing and plumbing, student and staff bathroom updates, and bleacher replacements for the gym. The plan for the gym bleachers is to put them on a warrant article at Town Meeting at a cost of $45,000. Regarding a Hero Academy Program proposed by Principal Kayne Beaudry during the last School Committee meeting, Laws said, “I just feel like, at this point, we can’t do anything beyond a level-budget except for the building substitute that doesn’t cost anything. I don’t see how we can entertain anything beyond a level budget especially since we are looking at cuts right now. It’s sad, but it’s where we are.” Proulx pointed out that Kingston does need the ESL teacher and that Halifax may need to look at cutting $32,000 to make space for it. “That would be a civil rights violation if you didn’t fund it,” Proulx said. Assistant Superintendent Ryan Lynch said that contracting the services rather than filling the position could end up costing considerably more than $32,000.
The School Committee voted to ask the Board of Selectmen to push back the timeframe for Town Meeting due to unknowns as well as lingering questions surrounding the school’s budget. Laws pointed out that overall enrollment at both the elementary level as well as Silver Lake Regional are down. She asked what cuts to classrooms might look like. Proulx said, “I think that you would be better served by giving us a dollar amount that you want us to cut, by then asking us to deliberate here in open session.” The dollar amount that was suggested by Town Administrator Cody Haddad for both Halifax Elementary and Silver Lake Regional is $1 million. The Committee came to the consensus that they should attempt to cut their portion of Halifax’s enrollment in Silver Lake which is roughly 32 percent. Proulx said that they would set about cutting $320,000 with the cuts labeled by tiers.
Proulx said that a Plympton School Committee member asked that a new agreement with PAC (Pilgrim Area Collaborative) be presented to the Halifax School Committee. “I’m asking the School Committee to review it and ultimately each school committee would review it and then the Chair would sign it,” she explained. Chair Lauren Laws asked if there was a timeframe and was told it had to be signed by April 30. The Committee agreed to table it until their April 1 meeting.
The issue of whether to distribute natural gas safety materials flyers to students came before the Committee. While not directly an advertisement, the name Eversource does appear throughout the flyer. Included in the distribution would be packets that actually smell like natural gas so students can learn to identify the scent. A Committee member asked if, instead, the information could be disseminated during the Fire Department visit rather than as a flyer promoting a company. Laws voted against distributing the flyer, but the rest of the Committee voted in favor and it passed.
The Committee also discussed advertising on school grounds as a result of a 100 days sign that was put up which shared a QR code. I thought the sign was really nice; it was just the QR code that was questionable, Laws said. Laws asked Beaudry if he attempted to take it down and he said they tried to find out where it came from and called it a “mistake.” Laws said that it was the QR code specifically that violated policy.
An update was given for the DEIB (diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging) Subcommittee. Lori Costa-Cline said they were looking to bring on a DEIB coordinator and asked Assistant Superintendent Ryan Lynch if he could help them with that. Costa-Cline asked Lynch, “What is the process, so we have school policies and district policies so if a school/district policy is violated, how does that interact with the student handbook in terms of like policy violations… the understanding, I think, we both have is we have school policies which gives our school community rights, protections, while they’re in the space of the school… if a violation happens, is there corrective action?” Proulx said that it depends on what is found during the investigation. If bullying is found, then the procedure for that is followed, if harassment is found, then that procedure is followed, etc. Putting it succinctly she said that necessary protocols are followed depending on what could be substantiated.
Beaudry provided a Principal’s Report. He said that School Council met on February 28 with the main focus being handbook revisions. He said a draft proposal would be shared with the Committee during the April 1 meeting. “The water issue, we just sent a notice out today, we’ve been doing monthly updates… so this was the third round of testing that we’ve done and we did find that there were still elevated areas in the building.” He said that they have been flushing the system every day beginning at 5:30 a.m. due to the high lead levels. “That has shown that it does reduce the levels,” Beaudry said. He also said that they have been working on replacing fixtures where the levels continue to be high.
Curriculum Coordinator Melissa Farrell appeared before the Committee to address some concerns over handwriting. She handed out the Committee a printout that included some of the Massachusetts’ frameworks connected to handwriting. She said that the art of handwriting starts in kindergarten with hand strength and noted that they use occupational cards to work on that aspect. She said they spend a minimum of 20 minutes a day working on that type of development. She said they continue to work on letter formation, etc. in first grade, but by second grade there is no official handwriting instruction. “Part of that comes from the idea that just consistent letter formation, letters start from the top, letters start from the top,” Farrell said. Committee member Jessica Page acknowledged that she was the person who brought forth the concern saying that her two young school-aged children (Grades K and 2) are struggling with it and are not appearing to get the instruction outlined by Farrell. “I’m scared that we are cheating our children by moving them past these basic skills too fast,” she said. Beaudry acknowledged that they even see fourth, fifth, and sixth graders that aren’t able to use proper capitalization, etc. He said that himself and the Assistant Principal are aware and talking about what needs to be done in the lower grades to address these issues.