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Shrewsbury officials thank voters after budget override passes
By Laura Hayes Contributing Writer
SHREWSBURY - With a “yes” vote by over 4,000 Shrewsbury residents, a $9.5 million Proposition 2 1/2 budget override has been approved.
Town officials, as a result, are celebrating.
According to the unofficial results released by the town, 4,323 voters voted “yes” and 2,769 voted “no” at the ballot box on May 4.
“This is a watershed moment in the history of Shrewsbury, as our town government will now have sufficient funding to provide the level and quality of services that our community expects over the next several years,” Shrewsbury Schools Superintendent Joseph Sawyer wrote in an email to the school community, sent immediately after unofficial results became available.
With the override passing, Sawyer said the school district will have a “much-improved and stable financial situation” for the next couple of years. Shrewsbury will not have to make any budget cuts next year.
Additionally, the district will be able to restore four positions of the approximately 30 positions that were cut across schools this year. Two of those are at Sherwood Middle School, and two are at Shrewsbury High School.
The largest source of revenue in Shrewsbury is property taxes.
Municipalities are generally able to increase property taxes by up to 2.5 percent a year under the state Proposition 2 ½ statute. But they can raise rates beyond 2.5 percent if voters approve an override, as just happened in Shrewsbury.
“We are extremely grateful to voters and look forward to opening the new Beal School as planned this fall, preserving our current educational staffing and programs, and enhancing municipal services to the benefit of all residents,” said Board of Selectmen Chair Beth Casavant.
She said the agreement between the Selectmen and School Committee offers an outline to a solution to the “structural deficit” challenging Shrewsbury budgets.
Prior to the vote on May 4, the last time Shrewsbury voters approved an override was in 2014. Before that, Shrewsbury’s first override request was in 2008, which voters struck down.
In addition to funding schools and municipal departments, money will be put aside in a stabilization account. The School Committee and Board of Selectmen have committed to no additional override questions for at least four years.
During an April 30 Superintendent’s Update, Sawyer said Shrewsbury was facing an “education emergency” not only because of the pandemic but also because of a “budget crisis” in terms of how the local government and the school district were funded.
For Shrewsbury schools, receiving revenue from the override now means the district will be able to maintain staffing and programming. Additionally, Sawyer said the district will be able to add staff to open the new Beal school and offer full-day, tuition-free kindergarten.
If the override had not passed, Sawyer said more positions would have had to been cut. Beal would not have been able to open as planned. Class sizes would have increased. Special subject programming would have decreased. Courses would have been cut at the high school level, and elementary media centers would have been closed.
“The difference between [no and yes] scenarios is gargantuan, and I could not be more pleased that our community said ‘Yes’ to supporting our schools and other town departments,” Sawyer wrote in his email.
Following the vote, Town Manager Kevin Mizikar wrote in an email to the Community Advocate that he was “grateful” for the override approval, which he said provides the town and schools with the resources to continue to provide services at expected levels.
“I do not take the trust that the residents have placed in us lightly,” Mizikar said. “I look forward to working with the Board of Selectmen to strategically move the Town forward.”
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COMMUNITY SCHOOLS Shrewsbury High School in top tier of national ranking
Westborough, Algonquin also perform well
By Laura Hayes Contributing Writer
SHREWSBURY — Shrewsbury High School is ranked among the top six percent of high schools nationwide, Shrewsbury Schools Superintendent Joseph Sawyer said in a Superintendent’s Update video on April 30.
The annual list is compiled by U.S. News & World Report, which ranked roughly 17,860 public high schools in every state and the District of Columbia.
Shrewsbury High School is ranked 43rd in the commonwealth, 984th in the country
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PHOTO COURTESY OF SHREWSBURY MEDIA CONNECTION A screenshot shows Shrewsbury Schools Superintendent Joseph Sawyer speaking in a video message to the community.
and 58th among STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) high schools.
“Congratulations,” Sawyer said. “That’s something all of us in our community should be very proud of.”
According to a U.S. News & World Report press release, the ranks were determined using state data from the 2018-2019 school year as well as data from the College Board and the International Baccalaureate.
Sawyer attributed the ranking not only to high school staff but to teachers in all grade levels.
“We can’t get results that are that strong without those foundational skills being taught from our students’ youngest ages,” Sawyer said.
Other local high schools appeared on the same rankings as Shrewsbury, with some having similar success.
Westborough High School was ranked 28th in Massachusetts. Algonquin Regional High School was ranked 54th, while Hudson High school was ranked 143rd. Grafton High School was ranked 145th and Marlborough High was ranked 252nd out of 365 high schools.
“Certainly the quality of the program that we were able to provide, again has put Shrewsbury in an extremely favorable light when it comes to how our students perform compared to those across the entire nation,” Sawyer said.
Armstrong Elementary plants trees for Arbor Day
By Dakota Antelman Managing Editor
WESTBOROUGH - While the region recently celebrated Earth Day, students at Armstrong Elementary School in Westborough also recognized Arbor Day on April 30.
As such, they planted a pair of trees on their school’s campus with the help of the Westborough Tree Planting Initiative (WTPI).
“We at WTPI are hoping to let the community know what we are up to and about and, most importantly, how other members of the community can help going forward,” group member Eric Waite wrote in a message to the Community Advocate.
The Tree Planting Initiative
A student dumps a shovel full of mulch onto the base of a tree.
PHOTO/JESSE KUCEWICZ
is an offshoot of the Sustainable Westborough Committee.
Waite said that Westborough has cut down over 2,000 of its trees in the last ten years. In response, he said just one percent of that canopy loss has been replaced.
“Knowing how beneficial a healthy tree canopy is to the town, WTPI has worked to get stakeholders together...and see what we can do to get more trees planted.”
The tree planting at Armstrong Elementary was part of that stakeholder outreach.
Moving forward, the Tree Planting Initiative aims to plant 250 new trees in town each year.
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