Manchester Essex School Finance Leaders Target Multi-Year Budget Plan at Joint Session

ESSEX — June 17, 2025 — Manchester Essex Regional School Committee finance leaders and town officials flagged annual override risk and launched multi-year budget planning at a joint session June 17. Representatives from the Essex Finance Committee, Essex Select Board, Manchester Finance Committee, and School Committee gathered without a formal action agenda to surface shared priorities for fiscal year 2027 and beyond. Essex Finance Committee Chair Sarah Mellis said her baseline concern was that operating costs not be sacrificed to fund a new Essex Elementary School building. Manchester Finance Committee Chair Jody Harris called for a three-to-five-year financial model and noted that existing projections put Essex "in override territory for the foreseeable future." Essex's school budget has grown from approximately $8.36 million in fiscal year 2022 to a projected $10.78 million in fiscal year 2026, even as enrollment has declined and 38 percent of Essex's population is now over 60. The group agreed to reconvene in early September and to schedule a workshop on high school course offerings and their staffing cost implications as the first agenda item of the new school year.