Board leaders and department heads from across Wellesley gathered at Town Hall on Monday to share their budget drivers for the upcoming fiscal 2027 year, which is expected to be a tight one when it kicks off in July (see Wellesley Media recording of Oct. 6 meeting). The Select Board plans to vote on budget guidelines on Oct. 16.
Over the summer, a positive update was shared about FY25 closing out, and back in May, government leaders reflected on the FY26 budget process, and began looking ahead to FY27.
Wellesley Executive Director Meghan Jop said at the All Board Meeting that the No. 1 upcoming budget driver is negotiations involving nine town unions and five school ones. The town hopes to get its agreements settled by the time Annual Town Meeting rolls around in the spring, though Jop said there are likely to be some stragglers. “That’s the major cost driver because it’s largely an unknown,” she said. The likely budget increase guidelines will be about 3%, she suggested, based on the town’s financial plan, with some outliers resulting in part from Wellesley’s revised compensation and job classification plan.
A sharp spike in healthcare costs is anticipated, but specifics are currently unknown. It could add millions to the town’s expenses. Town leaders have discussed keeping capital spending on the low end to buy Wellesley more overall financial flexibility.
Broader economic uncertainty, as in possible cuts to federal appropriations and the trickle down effect on state funding, is the other big factor facing Wellesley as it plans for its FY27 budget, Jop said. The town seeks to retain its current personnel positions, though doesn’t plan to add new full-time slots; Jop was recommending modest cost-of-living increases, and Human Resources Director Dolores Hamilton is making the rounds with peers in other communities to get a sense of what others are doing on the cost-of-living front.
Board and department updates
David Kornwitz, chair of the Retirement Board since 1992, kicked off board reports with an update on pension and other post-employment benefits (OPEB) funding and appropriations. “It’s all good news, it’s all in fact exceptional news,” he said.
“Wellesley is extremely fortunate to have the best-funded Retirement System in the Commonwealth, allowing the Board to keep appropriations for FY27 and FY28 at the same level as FY26, rather than increasing them by 3% annually. This results in savings of approximately $350,000 and $700,000 for the next two fiscal years, respectively,” Kornwitz wrote to us in a follow-up email.
“As for OPEB (retiree healthcare), Wellesley is light-years ahead of virtually every other municipality, with a funded ratio of about 93%—on an apples-to-apples basis with other towns. As a result, the Town will be reducing OPEB appropriations by $250,000 per year in the upcoming fiscal years. Once full funding is achieved, additional savings of about $1 million per year will be realized, in addition to the eventual elimination of the $2–$3 million currently being appropriated annually for OPEB,” he wrote.
Kornwitz wrapped up his comments at the All Board Meeting with an update on a bill under consideration for not the first time by the Massachusetts House of Representatives (H.1399) that he helped to draft and Rep. Alice Peisch has sponsored. It has to do with how healthcare is delivered Medicare-eligible retirees and if approved and enacted, would allow Wellesley to provide equal or better benefits at a significantly reduced cost. Wellesley’s OPEB liabilities could fall by as much as $30 million, resulting in annual savings of about $4–$5 million. What’s more, retirees could save an average of $4,000 per year, or $8,000 per retiree and spouse. “It’s just a changing landscape…it involves using the individual Medicare Marketplace rather than the Group Insurance Marketplace, and a different funding mechanism by using health reimbursement accounts rather than a premium reimbursement model…” he said.
Micah O’Neil spoke as chair of the Wellesley Housing Development Corp., now Wellesley Affordable Housing Trust. The outfit, which provides for the creation and preservation of affordable housing, has work plan development on its to-do list, and has about $1m in funds to put toward that. The Trust looks to partner with the state-and federally-funded Wellesley Housing Authority as well as other town bodies to study potential futures for the Morton Circle and Barton Road properties, and funds may be required for this research. The Trust also hopes to revisit what to do with the town-owned property at 156 Weston Rd., and possibly start a small grant program that could help those in need do things like add ramps to their homes.
Department of Public Works Director David Cohen (who was joined at the meeting by Board of Public Works members) said his group has a number of changes and increased costs coming up. The whopper is addressing PFAS (aka, forever chemicals) in the town’s water supply by adhering to stricter Environmental Protection Agency rules. This will amount to $10m in FY27 for a permanent treatment system at Morses Pond, plus millions more for temporary systems at other water sources, with millions more required in fiscal years to come for permanent systems at other water sources in town. “So PFAS is going to be with us for a while, there’s going to be some significant impacts in FY27 particularly,” he said. Expect water rates to soar, maybe 20%, as a result. One bit of good news is that the town is starting to get funds from PFAS settlements with manufacturers that can offset some costs.
The DPW is also reviewing job descriptions, so that could have a financial impact, and the department is wrapping up a 5-year contract for trash handling and expects a modest increase in the new deal. The DPW is getting ready to replace its baler (compactor) and the town will have a decision to make about how to replenish its baler replacement fund. A big budget increase will be $200k for sidewalk improvements. On the borrowing side, the town will need money to fund work on the lower side of Great Plain Avenue as well as Wellesley Square improvements, and it’s also time for replacing the turf field at the high school as it turns 10.
Up next was Jay McHale, who leads the Natural Resources Commission, and he pointed out that most of the NRC’s projects are capital related. It tries to tap Community Preservation Act funds when possible.
The big one coming up is the Morses Pond beach and bath house project, which continues to be a topic of NRC discussion. Renovations to the clocktower and the War Memorial (in front of Town Hall) are also on the table, and could be CPA fund candidates, too.
Board of Assessors Chair Arthur Garrity told those gathered that the Assessors Office is very small, with just four employees, but that the workload keeps growing with increases in properties, vehicles, etc. in town. Plans are to update the office’s computer-assisted mass appraisal system software used to produce fair valuations—the current database system is about 30 years old—and among other things this should improve the town’s ability to get a handle on commercial properties and condos. Special Town Meeting next month will hear a request to pay for this update, which will help the town stay on the right side of the state’s Department of Revenue.
Ann Howley from the Board of Library Trustees was brief in her remarks, though gave a heads up that a 3% to 5% increase in tech services is expected, as the library system needs to keep up in cybersecurity and other areas.
Planning Department Director Eric Arbeene said a capital cost worth noting would be a desired $400k ($300k is already set aside) to pay consultants to conduct a master plan for the town. This long-term roadmap would cover everything from housing to transportation, and open space to infrastructure. Wellesley last approved a Unified Plan in 2019.
School Committee Chair Niki Ofenloch acknowledged the complexity of the school budget, and said a longitudinal analysis is in the works that looks at major budget drivers over the past years in areas such as transportation, personnel, enrollment, and mandated services. School Committee meetings have been diving into the different components of this, and Ofenloch said the analysis shows why school costs are increasing even as enrollment falls. “This is not unique to Wellesley, this is a trend that’s seen across the state, across the nation. Basically every school district is grappling with this,” she said. Expenses on the rise for Wellesley include everything from special education to transportation.
Capital projects for schools include the team rooms coming to the track and field (a funding request will come at Special Town Meeting this fall) and air conditioning design funding (anticipated for Special Town Meeting in 2026). Bringing air conditioning to older Wellesley schools has been a big topic of conversation at recent Town Meetings, and the schools have been piloting solutions at different schools. Looking ahead, addressing the shortage of space for pre-school education is being looked at by the School Committee.
The operating budget is murky given that union negotiations are on the horizon.
Lise Olney, chair of the Climate Action Committee, led with data about the town’s greenhouse gas emissions falling 42% from 2007 levels thanks to various efforts, and highlighted work by Wellesley’s sustainability staff to score hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants for projects such as LED lighting retrofits at town facilities. (For more, see “There’s been non-stop climate action in Wellesley”).
Town Clerk KC Kato said her department’s costs rise and fall based on the number of elections. There’s just one this year, but three next year (local, state, primary).
The Select Board Office, per Jop, is seeing rising technology costs, and those include website archiving and accessibility.
Things get more serious with budget submission deadlines, which for non-Select Board departments is Dec. 9
Splitting town and school budgets
Select Board Chair Marjorie Freiman, picking up on a discussion from Annual Town Meeting about possibly separating the town and school budgets, said the board will make a motion to do just that. A motion put forward at 2025 Annual Town Meeting by a Town Meeting member won support from others, but failed to pass, with some arguing the motion came too late in the process.
Freiman emphasized that it’s not that schools don’t already publish their numbers, as anyone who has plowed through their lengthy budget book knows, but getting your arms around what the last time around was a $94m budget is challenging.
“It’s certainly not that anybody doesn’t support the schools, but the Select Board has decided to present the budgets for the town and the schools separately to allow a little more deep dive for people into the different components, and that means on the town side as well as the school side,” she said.
One piece of this will be accounting for school costs within the town budgets, such as facilities and health care, Jop said.
Separately, the Select Board is considering changes to the town’s capital planning process with the goal of coming up with a comprehensive 10-year capital plan. Creating a Town-Wide Capital Planning Committee is proposed to better coordinate and prioritize hundreds of millions of dollars in projects in a transparent way involving more public engagement.
Note: This post was updated on 10/9 to include David Kornwitz’s comments on pensions and OPEB.
