Brookline Select Board begins public debate on study committee's override recommendations, favors tiered option

The Brookline Select Board on March 17 began public deliberations on a 639-page report from the Expenditure and Revenue Study Committee that lays out options for a proposed property-tax override on the May ballot.

Chair Bernard Green opened the workshop by saying the session was "our first public discussion of the recommendation of the expenditure and revenue study committee with respect to a possible override," and that the board would hold further deliberations on March 24 and could finalize ballot language before the March 31 filing deadline.

Committee presenters summarized the town's fiscal outlook and three alternative approaches for raising revenue to close a roughly $26 million three-year structural deficit: a full "pay-as-you-go" ask, a front-loaded levy that raises more up front and places the excess in a stabilization fund, and a tiered ballot that would offer voters multiple funding levels.

The committee's representative, Saddaf Kazmi, described the preferred option as a tiered override that "adds tiers to what is put on the ballot" and said the committee recommended that both the town and public schools prepare prioritized lists of services that would be cut at intermediate levels so voters would know the consequences of each tier.

Presenters and board members discussed the two headline examples developed by the committee. One example — the full…