Easthampton 2027 Budget Explorer

Published May 17, 2026

Updated June 8, 2026

Why two budgets?

Easthampton will hold an election on June 9th, 2026 to vote on a new 2027 city budget.

Due to Massachusetts Proposition 2 1/2, Easthampton may not raise property taxes more than 2.5% per year unless residents vote to approve the increase.

Mayor Salem Derby is asking residents to vote for an override to accept a budget that exceeds the 2.5% maximum annual tax increase. The mayor’s office published two potential budgets

The Easthampton Mayor’s office has published two possible budgets for 2027:

$62M Budget (does not require an override)
$65.4M Budget (requires an override)

The June 9th election decides which budget goes into effect for 2027. If the override vote fails, the budget will default to the $62M version. If the vote passes, the city will increase property taxes to fund the $65.4M budget.

Note: The budget below reflects the version of the budget that was published for most of the election (the May 8th, 2026 version).

The mayor’s office published a new version of the budget a few days before the election. I believe it was published only on June 8th, but it’s possible it came out June 6th, and I missed it. The files are labeled “6-6-26,” though that doesn’t necessarily match the date the files were published to voters.

I unfortunately did not have enough time to update the explorer to reflect the latest budget proposal before the election, as there is significant work in extracting data from the PDF, and the mayor’s office did not disclose what changed in the latest version.

Why a budget explorer?

The official versions of the budget are PDFs, which makes them difficult to explore and compare, so I’ve converted them to an interactive explorer that allows residents to compare both budgets item by item:

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Accuracy

I’ve checked that the numbers in my explorer match the department-level totals and subtotals, but it’s possible that I introduced errors when extracting the data from the source PDFs.

If you see any errors, please let me know.

Clarifications from Mayor Derby

I emailed several questions about the budget to Easthampton Mayor Salem Derby. I’ve included my questions and the responses I received from Mayor Derby below.

Revenue

Why does the override budget assume 50% higher new growth?

Why does the the “With Override” budget assume $200k of new growth property tax revenue while the “Without Override” budget assumes $300k? In other words, how will the city’s property tax base grow $100k more with a tighter budget?

New growth is an estimated figure. The two scenarios reflect different approaches, one more conservative, one less so. The “Without Override” budget uses the higher estimate as a more optimistic projection of property development activity under a constrained budget. This is a modeling assumption.

Why does the override budget assume local receipts will be $1M lower?

Why does the “With Override” budget project that local receipts will be $1M lower if the override succeeds? The “With Override” budget lists local receipts as $6,086,505.08, whereas the “Without Override” budget lists them as $7,154,753.69.

How would the property tax increase affect this revenue source?

Local receipts are also an estimated figure, where we have more flexibility than other revenue categories. The two scenarios again reflect different conservative vs. non-conservative approaches to projecting discretionary revenue. At the end of the day, both budgets must balance, and expenses must be matched by equivalent revenue.

Why does the override budget assume a $92k increase in Enterprise revenue?

Why does the “With Override” budget project a $92k increase in Enterprise Revenue?

Enterprise chargeback revenues are calculated as a percentage of departmental budgets. When departmental budgets are reduced in the non-override scenario, the percentage charged back changes, which produces the variance you identified. The difference reflects cuts to the departments included in the enterprise chargeback calculations.

School budget

What are the two line items labeled as “School Related” in the “Unclassified Expenses” section?

“School Related” line items in Unclassified Expenses: Account 001.9120.5600 is School Workers’ Compensation, and 001.9140.5600 is School Health Insurance. These, along with the other school-specific items in Unclassified (School Medicare, School Liability Insurance, School Open Contribution), are tracked separately from the Education department budget because Massachusetts DESE has a compliance requirement for Net School Spending calculations. Tracking them centrally is how the city accurately captures the full dollar amount spent on schools for state reporting purposes.

Why does the override budget call for an $808k increase from 2026 in these “School related” line items?

The $808k increase in these line items under the override scenario: The override prevents the layoffs that would otherwise occur under the non-override plan. With employees retained, the city carries the health insurance cost for those positions, which is what drives the increase in this line item.

Why do school expenses appear under “Unclassified Expenses?”

Why are there six school-specific line items under “Unclassified Expenses” rather than with the other school expenses in the Education department budget?

[The “School related” line items], along with the other school-specific items in Unclassified (School Medicare, School Liability Insurance, School Open Contribution), are tracked separately from the Education department budget because Massachusetts DESE has a compliance requirement for Net School Spending calculations. Tracking them centrally is how the city accurately captures the full dollar amount spent on schools for state reporting purposes.

Why doesn’t the city’s budget for education match the education department’s budget?

Why has Easthampton’s education department announced a 2027 budget that’s $1M higher than what the city’s budget allocated to schools?

How does the school’s proposed FY27 budget of $24,969,268.16 relate to the figures in the city budget? Even the “With Override” budget only allocates $24,046,664.66 to the Education department, so there’s a discrepancy of about $1M.

The schools decided to cut that amount out of their budget.
If the override passes to downsize, considering the larger gap in the budget beyond the override (over 8 mill vs. 6.9 mill). Here is the presentation explaining this: https://www.epsd.us/about/school-committee

Organization

Is the “CHP 32B INSURANCES” line item in the “Unclassified Expenses” category represent health insurance for every city employee? If so, why does the city track health insurance that way rather than associating each employee’s insurance costs to the department in which they work?

Tracking insurance this way obscures the true cost of employee-heavy departments like Education.

The City follows the Massachusetts DOR UMAS accounting manual, which dictates how line items and budget categories are structured. The placement of CHP 32B insurance in Unclassified is required by that state framework, not a discretionary choice by our office.

2026 budget

What is the difference between “Original FY 2026” and “Adjusted FY 2026” in the budgets?

“Original FY2026” is the budget as voted and approved by City Council.
“Adjusted FY2026” reflects any changes made after that approval, including intra- and inter-departmental transfers and supplemental appropriations.

In the “Budget Ad” on page 9, are the FY26 totals based on “Original FY 2026” or “Adjusted FY 2026”? Neither number seems to match the 2026 line items in the detailed budget exactly.

Our finance team is reviewing the specific figures on page 9 of the Budget Ad, and I will follow up on that item.

Other

Why does the Fire Department have two uniform budgets?

In both budgets, under B - Public Safety - Fire, there are two separate line items labeled “UNIFORM ALLOWANCE” with different values.

This reflects current hires vs. new hires - new hires require a full uniform kit when they begin, which is tracked separately from the standard uniform allowance.

Errors I reported

I have reported several errors in the budget to Mayor Derby. I’ve included my reports and Mayor Derby’s responses below.

Note that in cases where Mayor Derby describes an error as “fixed,” the fix is in a copy of the budget that has not yet been made available to the public. The budget explorer above reflects the latest publicly available versions of the 2027 budget plans.

Missing salary in Technology budget

In the “With Override” budget, there is an error in the “A - General Government > Technology” section. Personnel line items sum to $243,248.99, but the PDF lists the personnel subtotal as $239,677.18, a $3,571.81 discrepancy.

We are aware of this. The total is correct, but one employee’s salary line did not calculate correctly in the document. This was raised at the Finance Committee meeting and is on our correction list.

Rounding errors

The “Without Override” line items for “CHP32B” under Unclassified are all higher than the “With Override” budget, for a total of $41,937.

On this, our HR director estimated this based on a rounded up 13% as opposed to the actual 12.48%, and this number is the difference and has been addressed and fixed. This was discussed in the unclassified budget finance meeting.

The “Without Override” line item for School - “NON NET SPENDING PUR OF SER.” is $1.00 higher than the same line item in the “With Override.”

This was Google Sheets rounding and is being addressed

The “Without Override” line item for Fire - “HOLIDAY PAY” is $0.88 higher than the same line item in the “With Override.”

This was Google Sheets rounding and is being addressed

The “Without override” budget shows a total of $35,663,334.66 for “Tax Levy (Property Tax),” but the line items sum to $35,663,334.32, a difference of $0.34.

I believe this is a rounding error, but we are double-checking, and it will be addressed.

The “With override” budget shows a total of $42,443,334.66 for “Tax Levy (Property Tax),” but the line items sum to $42,443,334.32, a difference of $0.34.