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Superintendent presents FY26 school budget; Student Opportunity Act funding used to rebuild staff and facilities
Summary
Superintendent Thomas O'Leary presented the New Bedford Public Schools’ FY26 budget on June 5, saying state Student Opportunity Act funds since FY22 helped expand staff, improve facilities and support curricular investments; the school committee approved a $267,059,472 total budget.
Superintendent Thomas O'Leary opened the school-department presentation at the June 5 budget hearing by reviewing how state aid from the Student Opportunity Act (SOA) has affected New Bedford since FY22. "We are essentially in year 6 of the state’s Student Opportunity Act commitment," O'Leary said, adding that the city has used that funding to add staff, upgrade facilities and expand programs.
O'Leary told the council that approximately $75 million in SOA-related state aid to the district since FY22 broke down into roughly $30 million for normal operational growth (pay and inflation), about $20 million for mandated or non-discretionary costs (special education, health insurance and other increases), and the remainder invested in strategic staffing and building improvements. He said the district now has higher FTE counts for paraeducators, co-teaching and other student-support roles and that facility improvements — including MSBA projects such as Duval Congdon — have reduced the share of students in substandard facilities.
On FY26 numbers, O'Leary said the school committee approved a net school spending total just under $250 million and a full school committee budget of $267,059,472 (including transportation and other non-net-school-spending items). He said the budget preserves class sizes in the low 20s and funds curricular adoption, expansion of Chapter 74 career programs at New Bedford High School, and an after‑hours program that connects students to vocational training.
Councilors asked several follow-ups. Councilor Perera asked why the retirement/pension assessment was level-funded in the presentation; O'Leary said that figure had been a placeholder while the district awaited final city actuarial and assessment methodology and that he had expected a mid-single-digit percentage change rather than the larger change discussed later in the hearing. Perera asked for classroom-size trends and pupil-teacher ratios; O'Leary said average classrooms are “in the low twenties” and that the district will provide a multi-year trend and a per-school breakdown.
O'Leary described circuit breaker special-education reimbursement as a prior-year reimbursement program: districts submit claims after the fiscal year and the state pays a percentage of extraordinary special-education costs in a later year; those reimbursements are often reinvested in curriculum, facilities and other classroom needs. He and assistant superintendent David Flynn said that negotiations with the district's largest bargaining units (teachers and paraeducators) are underway, that agreements will be reflected in the FY26 budget, and that the administration aims to finalize multi-year contracts.
Ending: The superintendent said the district will provide the council requested details — pension assessment schedules, classroom-size trends and a more specific FTE breakdown for FY26 — and reiterated the school committee’s approval of the FY26 spending plan. Council staff and school financial staff agreed to turn around requested documents promptly to assist the council’s budget deliberations.
