North Attleborough schools weigh $2.1M in salary costs, athletics and teacher hires after town manager’s lower budget

North Attleborough Public Schools staff told the School Committee on Oct. 26 that a needs-based budget request of $53,400,000 exceeds the town manager’s recently presented $51,300,000 figure by more than $2 million, and the committee agreed not to vote on a final budget until a firm number is available.

Speaker 1, a school staff member, said, “We had, again, developed a needs based budget because we were asked to. And that needs based budget totaled 53,400,000.0, but the town manager did present his budget to town council a couple of weeks ago. And his budget, number is right here, 51,300,000.0, which is over $2,000,000 less than what we had asked for.”

That difference frames choices the district is considering for next year’s operating budget. The presentation laid out a starting point “last year’s budget” of roughly $49,000,000 and a set of required additions, including roughly $2,100,000 to fund salaries for existing personnel. Speaker 1 said an additional $200,000 of revenue could be assumed as an option to narrow the gap.

The committee discussed specific priorities to preserve if the district adopts a smaller budget: funding salaries for existing staff, establishing a dedicated athletics operating budget, and hiring three teachers intended to reduce high class sizes. Speaker 1 summarized: “In summary, we could fund salaries for existing personnel. We could finally take care of our athletics budget. We could address some high class sizes, but we can't do anything else.”

On athletics, the staff proposal includes an increase and an anticipated corresponding rise in user fees. Speaker 1 noted, “There is a corresponding increase to user fees in in that in that proposal, which we talked about at length in January.” During discussion one committee member asked, “The fund athletics hundred thousand, is that before or after user fees may or may not be assessed?” and Speaker 1 replied, “That's with user fees.” The record does not specify the final athletics line item beyond the referenced $100,000 figure.

The committee also discussed a current posting for a community school assistant principal. Speaker 2, a school committee member, suggested rewriting the posting so the hire would serve as assistant principal at the community school and “be a part time assistant principal at Ambit School,” with a higher salary to reflect that shared assignment. Speaker 3, an administrator, cautioned about workload, saying shared assignments have precedent in other districts but are “obviously not ideal.” Speaker 2 responded that “desperate times call for desperate measures” if budget constraints require creative staffing.

State education funding was raised by Speaker 4, a school committee member, who said Adam Scanlon “has been incredibly clear … that the Chapter 70 fund should be coming to the schools.” Speaker 4 added they had asked Dr. Antonucci that the committee not take a vote at this meeting because the committee “still don't have a firm number.”

No formal vote on the budget occurred. The committee’s immediate direction was to defer a decision until the district can reconcile the needs-based request with the town manager’s number and confirm available revenues such as the $200,000 discussed and any Chapter 70 allocations.

The meeting record notes the town manager already presented a budget to the town council “a couple of weeks ago,” but it does not record any council action or a definitive final funding amount from the town or the state.

Next steps described during the discussion include further work to prioritize the listed items and return with clarified revenue figures; no motions or formal approvals were recorded at this meeting.