The School Committee’s Budgeting Subcommittee met Tuesday morning to discuss the budget for both fiscal year 2025 and fiscal year 2026, including how the strike affected the overall budget.
Michael Pfifferling, Assistant Superintendent of Finances and Operations, opened the meeting with a FY25 budgeting update. While the data at this meeting held three more weeks of data compared to the previous Dec. meeting, Pfifferling stated the data was about the same.
One thing Pfifferling was somewhat concerned about was the special education out-of-district budget, which was about $1 million over budget. School Committee Co-Chair Sarah Fox explained that out-of-district student numbers have come in higher than budgeted. But due to pre-payments being made on the account, committee members remain comfortable with the price tag.
Pfifferling further explained they are about $1 million in tuition over budget and roughly another $100 thousand in transportation costs. But they have prepaid $900 thousand leaving only $200 thousand unpaid. The overall budget for out-of-district was $2.3 million, but the district is expected to come in around $3.3 million.
Fox then asked if any other budgets need to be kept under tight watch that are running a higher variance similar to the out-of-district budget. Pfifferling stated the legal line for the budget is exceeding expectations, but that is not unexpected considering the 2-week-long teacher’s strike in November.
Roughly five days into the strike, the Marblehead Education Association (MEA) was handed fines by the Essex Superior Court Judge totaling more than the MEA could afford. After only two days, the MEA ran out of money in their budget to pay these fines, which the School Committee ultimately had to pick up, according to Fox.
Pfifferling shared that the budget for the legal limit was originally $165 thousand: $115 thousand to the school committee mainly for negotiations, and $50 thousand to special education. Currently, there is only $11 thousand attributed to strike-related fees specifically for police details; food services, overtime, and payroll have not been added. The court fees will be attributed to the legal budget.
Looking ahead to the FY26 budget planning, there hasn’t been much planning over the last few months. Due to the strike and the month or so spent negotiating in the Marblehead High School library, the School Committee and associated finance professionals have been unable to devote time to planning next year’s budget.
In terms of the potential override needed to comfortably fund the new teacher’s contracts and any other repairs or funds, the committee has not configured those numbers yet.
“Until we know what the state of the town is and what the revenue streams are that will be allocated to us, and what our budget is and how those compare,” Fox stated. “It is very premature to say anything about an override because we don’t know what the state of the town is going to present.”
A large part of the budget includes enrollment, and ascertaining how many students the Marblehead public schools will have in their system. According to Fox, the enrollment counts come out every Monday, and Marblehead has lost 22 students since the strike occurred. In comparison to prior years, Marblehead has gained students during this time of year.
Superintendent John Robidoux said he received two emails stating their children’s unenrollment was directly related to the strike.
Also discussed was the fact that enrollment has been declining overall for the last few years while educator staffing has remained the same or even inclined. Fox shared the differences between what was being said by the staff–that they were understaffed and not safely staffed– and data that shows the number of students decreasing while teachers continue to be hired.
“We need to show the data: we are safely staffed, and we are appropriately staffed,” Fox said. “We’re going to have to either verify the narrative or show that it isn’t true. But we can’t just ignore the narrative.”
Robidoux further added there may be different pockets within the school system that are understaffed while other pockets may show overstaffing.
The subcommittee planned to meet on Feb. 3 to present the FY26 budget books, including what each school believes they need for the following year. The School Department will hold another meeting on Mar. 31 to present the final finances agreed upon.
