ATHOL – The FY26 state budget signed into law by Gov. Maura Healey on July 4 included a mixed bag for cities and towns when it comes to local aid for the upcoming fiscal year.
Athol will receive $51,000 less than anticipated, according to Town Manager Shaun Suhoski. which further tightens the town’s budget and highlights the uncertainty surrounding potential impact of federal cuts on state and local budgets.
The town based its state aid projection on the budget submitted earlier this year by Healey. The amount recommended for Athol was just over $3,331,000. The final budget passed by the Legislature and signed by the governor reduced that to approximately $2,280,000.
The town manager added that revenue from other sources is also down.
While most of the revenue that supports the town budget comes from personal and property taxes, Suhoski said, “…we have motor vehicle excise, meals tax, cannabis, room tax – there’s a whole menu of revenues that come in. We project those revenues conservatively because you don’t want to fall short – then you’re hurting. In this case (for FY26), those revenues are down.”
Suhoski said he does have a couple of ways to address the problem.
“We have at least two positions we haven’t filled – one in highway, one in health,” he said. “We’re waiting to see how things unfold. They were funded for the new fiscal year, but we’ve held off on filling them.
“The other thing, is our cannabis revenues have been declining because the market has been short; Elev8 closed. But what we found is that in the most recent fiscal year it trended up a little bit. Hometown Harvest is going to open where Elev8 was, so we see that trend (upward) probably continuing.”
Suhoski said the town, despite the lower figures in state aid and anticipated revenues, shouldn’t have any difficulty in meeting the $26.4 million budget approved at Town Meeting.
“We’re already kind of looking at next fiscal year already,” he said.
This year, he noted, all of the town’s collective bargaining units agreed to one-year contracts which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year.
“That’s how we avoided any overrides this year,” he added. “We didn’t want to run into an override situation without the time to educate voters and think through the situation.”
Asked if he anticipated the need for an override next year, Suhoski replied, “I anticipate we’re going to be looking at other revenue options. Through this one-year extension, nobody was laid off this year. We kept our progress, so hard-earned over the past decade, we’ve kept it in place. So, everyone – the public, all the committees, the unions, the staff – have all fall and into the winter to try to figure out our options.”
Royalston also saw a reduction in anticipated state aid, according to Selectboard member Linda Alger. The town had anticipated $382,312, but will instead receive $379,806; a difference of just over $2,500. Phillipston ended up receiving a bit more state aid than planned for. The town budgeted for $337,483 and will receive $338,923.
Greg Vine can be reached at gvineadn@gmail.com.