Superintendent Anna Nolin is asking for $317.3 million for the Fiscal Year 2027 NPS budget, to keep services level and position the district to work toward the ultimate goal of attaining what she calls a “Thrive” budget.

“That’s a lot,” Nolin acknowledged as she gave her budget presentation to the School Committee Monday night.

And due to a mess made by inflation and state and federal funding uncertainty, it’s also almost $3 million more than the amount she and Mayor Marc Laredo had talked about NPS getting.

But Nolin’s presentation came at the start of a new chapter for its schools, with a new mayor and six out of eight School Committee members new as well, and she and Laredo met that occasion Monday with cautious optimism.

Road’s been rough

Last year, with Newtonians still exhausted by the previous winter’s teacher strike, crisis loomed again. A dramatic rise in health care costs was the primary driver in a large gap between what Nolin said NPS needed to keep services level and what then-Mayor Ruthanne Fuller said was available for NPS. After some maneuvering by CFO Maureen Lemieux, Nolin was able to move ahead with a level-services budget but only by assuming risks.

“One of those risk assumptions was to underfund substitutes by a million dollars,” Nolin said. “The other was to count on our tenure turnover savings to the tune of $2.6 million.” Tenure turnover savings happen when more experienced teachers leave and are replaced with newer teachers who haven’t earned as many cost-of-living pay increases. “We also had to save $3 5 million from last year to carry it forward to this year.” 

Now, Nolin’s FY2027 budget serves to show what she and her central office team have accomplished since she arrived at the helm of NPS in 2023—right after a Proposition 2 ½ override effort that would have helped fund school salaries was rejected by voters and during a teacher contract battle that would escalate to a two-week strike.

“We were given a challenge three years ago to right-size the budget and to come up with $5 million of reductions that would recur in a five-year period,” Nolin recalled. “We took up that challenge, and also faced a few other challenges from FY2024 to ’27 post-failed-override. There were some major reductions that had to occur to meet the available resources that the city had at that time.”

Those reductions included faculty, literacy specialists, IT staff, athletics programming, mentoring and more. But the district is set to meet that $5 million-over-five-years target.

There was confusion and concern over what this year’s base amount—the last fiscal year’s dollar amount, which the next budget would start from—since Fuller had planned for around $292 million and the actual level-services budget was just over $297 million. Laredo, Nolin said, put her mind at ease by pledging to work from the higher number.

“And I just want to say our new mayor has absolutely taken away a great deal of stress from the school system by not playing those same kinds of songs around the budget,” Nolin said before turning to Laredo. “And I just want to thank you, Mayor Laredo, for understanding and seeing what the actual cost of running the system was, and that $297.4 million base allocation was required for us to run the system, and that the kinds of risks taken on were not ones that you would have approved of, either.”

This chart, made by Superintendent Nolin, shows five school budgets with varying amounts of increase. Newton Public Schools

A vibe for “Thrive”

That rough road is part of a journey for Nolin’s ultimate goal—to get to a ”Thrive” budget by 2030.

As a guide, Nolin uses a color-coded chart with five potential budgets ranging from a “cuts” budget in red to a “thrive” budget in green. A “thrive” budget would have everything funded as well as large investments made in new programming.

Last year, the district was initially looking at a red “cuts” budget, but after those deals were made and more cuts were found, Nolin was able to land the district in the middle, a “level services” budget.

Nolin, however, has made it clear that the middle won’t do, and she is determined to get the district to “thrive” by 2030. And she made it just as clear Monday that she sees Laredo as a partner for that journey.

Thanking Laredo for giving her “fewer gray hairs,” Nolin laid out how the district can start on the road to a “Thrive” budget with the new administration now.

“And to that end, I want to say that another piece I appreciate about our new mayor is him extending the vibe that he would not like to discuss a tale of five budgets. He would like to discuss how we get on the path to thrive,” Nolin said. “How do we take those first steps?”

With help from the School Committee, Nolin has created the framework for a five-year investment plan that, if it comes to fruition, would get Newton Public Schools to a “Thrive” budget.

That would mean that kids who suffered the impacts of COVID-19 school closures at the start of their NPS journey and had to deal with a teacher strike in middle school could graduate high school under a “Thrive” budget.

Superintendent Nolin’s budget request would keep services level and make adjustments to set the district toward a “Thrive” budget. Newton Public Schools

Costly hurdles

Nolin said the numbers for FY2027 were looking good this past summer, with a level-services figure of about $314.6.

But then a familiar foe showed up: inflation, accompanied by state budget cut projections. So the request jumped to $317.3 million.

Some drivers of this spike were seen ahead of time, including cost-of-living increases for teachers set during that contentious contract fight of 2023 and 2024 and a 10 percent increase in health insurance costs this year.

That second factor was exacerbated when, after Affordable Care Act subsidies were cut, a bunch of NPS employees ditched their ACA plans and opted back onto the district’s health insurance plan.

“I will also say, I don’t know what your utility bills look like, but mine have doubled at my own house,” Nolin said. “And Newton Public Schools is opening four new buildings this year, all of them have a larger footprint, and all of them have air-conditioning.”

A rise in utility rates, combined with Newton opening four new schools (all with air-conditioning), has meant a $1.2 million increase in utility spending.

And a court ruling requiring aides in every kindergarten class—as established in an earlier contract negotiation—adds more than $900,000 in recurring salary expenses.

The road to “Thrive” will likely continue to be a rough one, but it’s a road Nolin—who has joked about school budgeting being like riding her Harley Davidson—is set on taking the district. For now, though, it’s mostly about keeping services level in preparation for the next stretch of that roadway.

“So, here I sat, with all of this knowledge, wanting to tell you all about the ‘Thrive’ investments we want to make but knowing that that would actually mean I’d be asking for an 8 percent increase,” Nolin said.

She didn’t dare ask for 8 percent, but she was tempted.

“I want to ask for that, because I want our kids to have it, and I want us to fulfill the strategic plan. But I also know that we live in an ecosystem. And we need to work within that.”

Nolin gave a glimpse into what some of those “Thrive” investments would be, including math program upgrades, student services and an increase of nearly $1 million for the district’s teaching and learning budget (money for teaching materials, which teachers often have to buy themselves).

“I’m not discounting the very generous $314 million that the mayor has set for us, but it’s my job to ask for things for kids, and I’m going to do it,” Nolin said. “And what I’m going to say is that if a level-service ask is granted, I will find a way to try t0 achieve some of the ‘Thrive’ pathway within that budget.

‘No money tree’

Nolin is proposing $1.4 million in cuts at the central office, despite her personal concerns that central office staff is crucial in data collection and other state-mandated work that didn’t exist before the central office was expanded. She’s also proposing a decrease in health insurance rates and ways to offset utility cost hikes.

But meeting the $314.6 million would mean a reduction of elementary teachers and below-level-service for teaching and learning, in addition to other impacts. So, Nolin is sticking to her $317.3 million base allocation request.

Laredo said there is always a gap between what the NPS administration wants and what the city can afford.

“We all want as much money as possible to flow to our school system, but as I always say, there’s no money tree at City Hall,” Laredo said. “And we are constrained by Proposition 2 ½, and the city is giving the School Department, as the superintendent acknowledged, a very significant portion of resources.”

Given the higher base point mentioned earlier ($296 million), Laredo noted, Nolin’s request is actually more than a 7 percent increase over the lower $292 million base allocation that was Mayor Fuller’s starting point last year.

“We baked into the base, and that was something that I felt very strongly about, that that was the appropriate thing to do—it was fair to the schools and it was honest intellectually—but make no mistake about it. That’s 7 percent over what we did last year.”

Laredo added that he has some moves going on behind the scenes regarding the city’s pension liability, but he won’t elaborate on that yet.

“That has been a process that the School Committee, the City Council, my administration and outside experts from the community have been actively involved in,” Laredo said.

And for the two years following FY2027, Laredo said, he wants to set a 4.9 percent increase average for each year. That could mean 5.1 percent one year and 4.7 percent the next.

“I do think the committee and the public have to be aware of our limitations,” Laredo said.

Laredo emphasized that he wants discussions to remain civil and constructive throughout the next few weeks.

There’s a public hearing on the NPS budget set for later this month.

You can watch Monday night’s entire presentation here.