Winthrop School Committee adopts $40.2 million level-service budget for FY26

WINTHROP — March 31, 2025 — Winthrop School Committee unanimously adopts $40.2 million budget and warns of 37 staff cuts if override fails. At the March 31 meeting, Superintendent Lisa Howard presented a worst-case reduction plan totaling $3,365,471 that would eliminate approximately 29.5 certified teaching positions and eight support staff roles across all four school buildings, pushing elementary class sizes from the low 20s into the 30s. The district's full operational cost before grant offsets stands at $42,660,068, with anticipated grants and revolving-account revenue of roughly $2.49 million reducing the town appropriation request to $40,165,471; the projected town allocation of $36,800,000 produces the structural gap. Howard cited a 15 percent employee health insurance increase — roughly $750,000 in new costs — as the single largest year-over-year driver, and flagged potential federal grant reductions as a second major risk. "We're scraping revenue accounts and charging people money to come to school so that we can pay for the minimum," Howard told the committee. The Proposition 2½ override vote is scheduled for Saturday, April 5.