On April 22, 2025 the Town Council passed the budget in a 5-4 vote. Councilors voting for included Chairman Peter Talbot, Vice Chair Jim Jinks, Deena Allard, Patricia Cramer and Greg Wolff. Councilors voting against included Fiona Pearson, John Milone, Don Walsh and David Veleber. You can view the entire budget adoption meeting here and watch each Town Councilor’s statements on the budget.
Generally speaking, the five vote majority in favor of this budget felt this was a maintenance budget, meaning simply maintaining services at the current level while managing inflation, wage increases and paying for the new schools was achieved. Councilor Fiona Pearson voted against this budget largely on the grounds that the cuts to the school budget were too deep. Our three Republican Town Councilors sought deeper education cuts. Cuts that the BOE made clear would’ve fell on teachers and paraeducators, meaning even larger class sizes.
The requested budget increase from the town and schools was 12% higher than last year. This was the starting point. After nearly thirty hours of department presentations, Q&A sessions and deliberations, the Council reduced the budget increase to 4.34%. This is about a 64% reduction in the requested increase and the lowest increase in three years. As well as a second straight year of lower budget increases.
The mill rate is now 29.74. Cheshire is still one of the lowest mill rates in the area and far lower than many towns that we compete with for new residents - like Glastonbury, North Haven, Woodbridge, Middlebury and others.
A taxpayer with an average home value in Cheshire and two vehicles of average value will have a tax increase of about $673 next year. While the Council would certainly prefer to have a lower tax increase there are a number of things to know as to why/how we ended-up where we ended-up.
First, about 31% (approximately $210) of the $673 tax increase is from the costs of building two new elementary schools. So, the tax increase to simply maintain as many services as possible on the town and school side is $463 (or $38.58 per month.) The budget increase on the town side was only 1.93% and on the schools side it was 4%. On the town side the budget increase doesn't keep up with average wage increases. On the school side it merely keeps up with wage increases. These skinny increases mean that we had to cut some positions in town departments and the schools will not fill some open positions and may have to cut some teacher and/or paraeducator positions. We’re confident they’ll do their best to minimize the impact on classrooms and without a doubt our schools will continue to be an impressive value for Cheshire taxpayers. Nevertheless, the BOE estimates that the average class sizes in the elementary grades may go up to 19 students. This will be the largest number in the elementary grades in many years.
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It’s clear that balancing the budget on the backs of our school families isn’t sustainable, nevertheless our Republican colleagues were advocating for a much deeper cut to the school budget. Unless the state increases our Education Cost Sharing (ECS) grant -it’s been level for years- and/or the ever-increasing costs of healthcare somehow bend in our favor, as a community we’re going to have decide what our true priorities are in terms of what services are provided on the town side. In other words, we can’t keep siphoning off funds from the school budget to cover things like ‘bulky waste’ pickup or other ‘nice to haves.’ Our town departments and schools already function very efficiently and very lean. But as wages go up and medical benefits costs keep rising ahead of inflation, it’s time to begin to ask things like do we continue with municipal curbside trash collection, do we continue to support the town pool, can the current library hours be sustained, can we continue to offer rides for seniors and all the programming at the senior center, can we keep maintaining all our parks and keep offering summer camps and on and on.
Generally speaking, after years of supporting all these services, it would seem Cheshire residents still value all the services the town offers and our high-performing schools. The question now is with the demands of constructing two new schools and the impact on the mill rate, what’s the appetite for continuing to support town services and our schools?
At the budget forum on April 10, 2025 (watch) no one came to the podium to request a cut in specific services. There were some that expressed their concern with the budget increases (at the time the projected budget increase was still about 8%.) This is something we’re certainly all concerned about every year. There were also some that expressed concerns about the proposed cuts to the school budget. At the end of the day, it’s the Council’s job to try and balance all of these concerns. There’s never a way to make everyone happy and this year was no different. No one on the Council was happy or completely comfortable either, with where we ended-up. But we were able to find a way to continue to support the town services that Cheshire demands and support a 4% increase in the school budget. I’m also personally proud of the fact that this budget fully supports our police department, for the first time in over a decade. (We’re hoping to be able to share more details soon.) The budget was less than the BOE requested but with new school construction and the growth of our student population, as a community we’re spending more than ever on education (one of our most important priorities and the #1 reason people choose to move to Cheshire.)
It’s an election year so there are many that will make false claims and seek to mislead voters about the nature of this tax increase. We openly admit that the tax increases have been higher the past two years than in previous years. Last year was a revaluation year. Many homeowners saw the value of their homes increase by 40% or more. While the value of commercial property didn’t increase nearly as much. This means more of the tax burden shifted to residential property owners. This fact is in part why last year’s tax increase was an average of $396. This year the larger tax increase has to do with all the reasons previously mentioned - accelerating student population, a big increase in the debt service for the new school construction and big losses in revenue from the state and Feds. It was a perfect storm this year.
For years the school modernization process was kicked down the road over and over. As it happened, decisions made by previous Councils over many years resulted in the town finally biting the bullet and constructing new schools at the worst possible moment - the highest inflation and highest interest rates we’ve seen in years. This is a fact. Fortunately, our Democratic delegation in Hartford was able to secure a higher reimbursement rate, meaning we’re getting as much as 50% on qualified expenses (rather than the 38% we had been planning for in the run-up to the school referendum.) This higher reimbursement rate is helping to nullify some of the inflation and higher rates we’re facing in financing this $160 million plus construction project. And yet our Republican colleagues grumble about the higher reimbursement rate while also ignoring how much the new school construction is adding to this year’s mill rate increase (about 60%.) We can’t pretend these schools don’t need to be paid for and that the community voted in favor of these schools by a wide margin. The facts are the facts.
We have a lot to be proud of in Cheshire. A recent ranking of ‘best places’ to live had Cheshire at #11 in Connecticut. People move here for the schools, but they stay here because of everything else we have to offer and because this is a safe, well-run town at a tremendous value for the taxpayer. The proof is in all the new residential and commercial development in town, businesses investing in our town and the increasing demand for and value of our property.
We are concerned about the rising taxes on our fixed and lower-income taxpayers. As we’ve said before we need to investigate ways to alleviate more of the burden from our older residents with lower incomes. This past year the town’s tax burden reduction programs resulted in over $500,000 in tax savings to hundreds of households. It’s possible we could do more but we also need to be careful not to shift too much of the tax burden on young people and families. Raising a family is more costly than ever and the President’s import taxes are projected to cost American households over $4,000 more this year. This is assuredly not sustainable.
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