MELROSE — The City Council’s Appropriations Committee Tuesday unanimously voted to recommend to the full board that three different Proposition 2 1/2 override questions be put on the November 4 election ballot.
As proposed by Mayor Jen Grigoraitis, her staff and members of the Finance Task Force, the November ballot would include three override options: A $9.3 million request that would keep services at current reduced levels, preventing further job cuts; an $11.9 million option that would partially restore essential city and school services, reversing recent significant job and program cuts; and a $13.5 million request to substantially restore essential city and school services and positions, and invest in additional infrastructure.
The need to raise property taxes to stop the serious reduction of services and positions was mentioned by all the City Councilors during the Appropriations Committee meeting this week, and by several others who spoke as well. For every $1 million of an override amount, the average single-family homeowner would see property taxes increase about $100 each year, Grigoraitis said in answering one question from Ward 1 Councilor Manjula Karamcheti.
Councilor-At-Large Ward Hamilton said that he and his colleagues understand full well the challenges faced by all municipalities in the Commonwealth. Proposition 2 1/2 does not allow any community’s tax levy to increase by more than 2.5 percent in a year. When operating costs rise between 4 and 6 percent a year, there will eventually be a financial breaking point. Melrose is there, officials say.
In the budget Grigoraitis has presented for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 21 city positions will be lost across many departments. The city’s schools face a $4 million shortfall for the same year, and administrators have had to make some extremely tough decisions. User fees will increase for parents of athletes, team teaching at the Veterans Memorial Middle School will be eliminated as will the directors of Humanities and of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, one teaching position at the Franklin Early Childhood Center, a first grade teacher at the Hoover Elementary School, a kindergarten teacher and a grade four teacher at the Lincoln School, three teachers at the Roosevelt, three teachers at the Winthrop, 16 teachers and one full-time principal at the middle school and eight teachers at Melrose High School.
Because the city has a tiny commercial tax base, the load of the tax levy falls on residential property owners. There have been a handful of Proposition 2 1/2 elections held in Melrose, the majority of which have seen the requests fail.
Robert Bell spoke before the Appropriations Committee Tuesday, saying the city is facing an “existential financial situation.” To deal with it, Bell said, residents need to ask what kind of community they want to live in.
“No one is going to solve the problem for us,” he said. “We’re going to get what we pay for. No more and no less.”
Each voter needs to decide what they want for municipal services, he said, “and what we’re willing to pay for.”
Later in the meeting, Grigoraitis laid out the override request.
Here are some of her remarks:
Good evening, Councilors, and thank you for having me. As always, I am grateful for your service to Melrose and for your willingness to thoughtfully consider this override proposal for the ballot in November.
I’m here with Finance Task Force Co-Chairs, Melrose Chief Financial Officer Kerri Golden and School Business Manager Ken Kelley, and also in the audience are City Solicitor Shannon Phillips and School Superintendent Adam Deleidi. I would also like to thank our two Council members of the Finance Task Force, President (Leila) Migliorelli, Appropriations & Oversight Chair (Mark) Garipay, as well as School Committee Chair (Dorie) Withey and Vice Chair (Jen) McAndrew, for their dedication to our city, for the many hours of work that they put into this proposal before you, and for being here tonight.
I would also like to thank all the residents who shared your ideas with us over the last three months. Your insights were heard and appreciated.
Convened in February, the task force was charged with getting feedback and making recommendations concerning potential override questions. After seven meetings, a public community forum, many emails from residents, and advice and guidance from legal counsel, tonight we are presenting the task force’s unanimous recommendation.
During its discussions, the task force engaged in research on options for an override, reviewing the proposals and outcomes of override votes from dozens of towns throughout the region. We carefully considered the Massachusetts Department of Revenue, Division of Local Services model language and guidance for Proposition 2 1⁄2 ballot questions.
We discussed: staffing needs and requirements in the city and schools; revenue and expense forecasts; and anticipated increases to major cost drivers, such as union employee contracts, regional school assessments, pension obligations, employee benefits, school transportation, and special education costs.
During our process, Melrosians shared their concerns and fiscal priorities such as: school funding, services for our seniors, and investment in city buildings and infrastructure like our roads, sidewalks and parks.
Residents also conveyed very helpful feedback about the mechanics and logistics of a potential override, including: considering multiple options rather than an “all or nothing” single override ballot question; cautioning against pitting different parts of the city in opposition to one another; designating revenues raised by an override to clear priorities; and increased transparency. Thank you all for your genuine and thoughtful input.
Although many provided feedback and ideas about non-override sources of revenue for the city, such as land sales, changes to fee structures, or other creative fiscal measures, the fact remains that, under Massachusetts law, only one recourse is available to the City to raise revenue at the magnitude our budget demands: the Proposition 2 1⁄2 override.
Based on all of this, the members of the task force unanimously recommend a tiered override approach, which enables voters to select the level of services they want to support. And we have put that before you for consideration.
Those three options are:
- $9.3 million to stabilize services at the current reduced levels, preventing further job cuts,
- $11.9 million to partially restore essential city and school services, reversing recent
significant job and program cuts, or
• $13.5 million to substantially restore essential city and school services and positions and
invest in additional infrastructure.
Here’s how it works: Three override amounts are presented as three ballot questions, with information on what each level would fund. Voters would vote on each question, yes or no. If more than one question is approved by more than 50% of voters, the “question specifying the highest dollar amount” prevails. So, for example, if two of the three options pass, it is not the one with the highest “winning percentage,” but rather the highest dollar amount that goes into effect. Unlike the menu option recently employed in Medford and Winthrop, only one dollar amount will go into effect with a tiered override question.
We recommend this format because it provides multiple options to voters. It also clearly delineates what we can and cannot restore in the event of passage—there is no practical way to turn the clock back to a previous year and restore every budget cut, but we can target some of our top priorities for restoration and even reinvestment.
It is very important to note that all three options include baseline funding that would help stabilize our community through the end of Fiscal Year 2029:
• Each option includes funding for the next contract cycle (three years through FY 29) for all city and school employee union contracts– that’s 12 different contracts, including teachers, police and fire.
• All options include some level of funding for repairs to infrastructure, though the higher options would allow more funding for priorities like sidewalk repairs, roadwork, building maintenance, and parks.
• The options all plan for our major cost drivers to continue to exceed 2.5% year over year, including employee & retiree personnel costs like pensions, health benefits, overtime and medicare; insurance; municipal debt; vocational school assessments; school transportation; special education tuition; and utilities.
We heard from the community that they want a transparent plan that reflects, to the best of our ability to forecast, the costs and challenges our community is facing. I believe we have delivered that in this tiered override question approach.
Residents also expressed that they want a say in determining our path forward, together. This tiered option offers detailed and distinct options for the course we will chart together in the coming fiscal years.
As I have said many times, this community must choose to invest in ourselves. Costs continue to rise over and above 2.5 percent. The cuts we have made over the last several years are not sustainable. And what’s to come, without additional funding, will be even worse. As of today, our budget forecast model indicates that, without an override, we will be $4M short of the revenue needed to maintain level services from FY 26, a budget in which we have eliminated positions across the city and schools, into FY 27. While I know every resident has different things that we value and prioritize, it will take all of us deciding that we want to chart a different path forward for everyone in order to stop the cycle of budget cuts that we are now in.
We must fund our own government; no one is coming to save us. And that is an option available to us under Proposition 2 1⁄2 – the option I believe we must employ and which I earnestly recommend and support.
The language before you for approval for the ballot in November represents a set of responsible options for the voters. And I hope you will vote to move it forward and let the voters decide this fall.
Thank you for all you do.
A recording of the complete May 27, 2025 City Council meeting is available at www.mmtv3.org in the Government Meetings archive.