By Linda Conner Lambeck

WESTPORT — As the town heads toward the 2025-26 budget season, good vibes continue between school district and municipal officials.

The Board of Education, at what has become an annual December gathering with Board of Finance and Representative Town Meeting leaders, last week discussed spending expectations and the fiscal climate.

During the meeting, all three sides had nothing but positive things to say about each other, even if some bubbles were burst.

“I leave a little bit more depressed than I came in,” RTM Moderator Jeff Wieser admitted upon hearing the schools’ Chief Financial Officer Elio Longo outline fixed costs that could send next year’s education budget increase north of 6 percent.

Wieser said he hoped the town had weathered the worst of inflationary pressures. But fixed salary costs, which account for more than 60 percent of the education budget, promise to push the district’s $144 million operating budget up 4 percent without adding a single position.

Health insurance, which eats up $20 million of the budget, could go up 8.5 percent, according to the district’s insurance consultant. Keeping other costs from rising will be a challenge, Longo said.

“The headwinds are against us,” Wieser said, adding that the RTM has a history of supporting the school district despite tough fiscal challenges.

“I feel now we are starting at the right place,” added Board of Finance Chair Lee Caney. That’s unlike past years, when he said it was felt the school board proposed larger increases in anticipation of a cut.

“I really appreciate what the Board of Education is doing now,” Caney said. “It has helped our relationship … That is not to say there isn’t going to be debate.”

Board of Finance member Jeff Hammer promised to ask tough questions.

“We appreciate the tough questions,” said school board Vice Chair Dorie Hordon, who led the meeting. “Bring them on. It brings about transparency and makes us think about things.”

Hordon said the board’s role is to keep Westport schools amazing and that the budget process, under Supt. of Schools Thomas Scarice has run so much smoother than in the past.

Work on the budget for a new fiscal year begins in October with building principals laying out proposals that this month will be vetted during a two-day administrative workshop.

In early January, Scarice will present his budget plan to the board during a full-day meeting.

Last year, with a large projected insurance increase, the focus was on preserving and protecting the existing budget. A proposal to add two assistant principal positions failed on a tie vote.

Some members of the town contingent cautioned school officials against adding more staff.

“Any additional staff you should think really hard about,” said Caney, noting the amount of money the town will be spending in debt service for a new Long Lots Elementary School — projected at roughly $100 million — and eventually a redo of Coleytown Elementary School.

Preliminary enrollment projections for the town’s schools next year stand at about 5,320, including preschoolers and about 36 out-of-district placements. Elementary school sections are expected to remain the same as this year at 121.

Board of Finance member Danielle.Dobin said she looks forward to seeing what is in the 20 percent of the budget not tied up in personnel.

Other cost drivers to school spending are transportation, special education, utilities and supplies.

It is hoped some outdated technology can be replaced this year.

Special education expenses were called a wildcard, but efforts are being made, town officials were told, to send fewer students to costly out of district placements.

On transportation, school officials say they are in the second year of a five-year contract with a new provider, First Student, and are happy with the service.

The fixed rate for the bus contract, Longo said, is coming in under inflation. The school district and Police Department are reaping the benefits of a $280,000 a year credit for allowing the bus company to park the fleet at the Greens Farms Railroad Station, instead of securing its own parking lot.

Beyond that, a transportation study is underway comparing actual and projected ridership. A report is due early next year.

School board member Robert Harrington said he believes the district runs more buses than it needs and wants to pilot an opt-out program to reduce ridership.

Any significant transportation savings, the board was warned, could involve changing school start times.

Board of Finance member Liz Heyer, a former school board member, said she hopes that any money the district does save on the transportation front can be reinvested into the schools rather than result in a spending reduction.

Freelance writer Linda Conner Lambeck, a reporter for more than four decades at the Connecticut Post and other Hearst publications, is a member of the Education Writers Association.