Dear Dighton-Rehoboth Regional School District:

I would like to start by saying that both the Town of Rehoboth and the Town of Dighton have been extremely generous when it comes to the funding of our regional school district. Clearly, in the Town of Rehoboth the voters have approved new windows, new roofs and for the first time in the history of Rehoboth voters approved overwhelmingly a 2 1/2 proposition override in fy2019.

In Dighton, the town has supported a fully funded budget year after year and recently voted for 4 modular classrooms to help support an enrollment increase. As a regional school district, both towns supported the construction of a new roof for the high school. Most recently, Dighton has once again supported the budget for fy2020 and has made it clear that education is an absolute priority.

As you know, every school year is different, but always an exciting time of year. Although there were difficulties surrounding the Fiscal Year 2020 budget (which is still in limbo pending a vote at the fall town meeting in Rehoboth), the district is in good shape. Moreover, the angst created by the budget did not negatively impact the beginning of the school year. All programs and staff were in place, although this summer it looked like that might not be the case because of the budget problems. Any fees that were needed upfront for sports were covered by user fees. We were able to start all of our high school programs on time without a bump to the schedules.

At this time, you are probably aware that the school district has been operating under a 1/12th budget set by the Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) since the Fiscal Year 2020 budget was not finalized due to an impasse between the Town of Rehoboth and the Regional School Committee. There was a gap of approximately $801,000 between the school committee’s assessment and the Rehoboth Finance Committee’s recommendation. The School District reduced that gap to approximately $558k and most recently the Rehoboth’s Board of Selectmen and the school committee worked out a compromise for the budget heading into the October 29th Rehoboth Town Meeting. Thus, the selectmen will be identifying reductions of about $330,000 to their budget and the school committee identified approximately an additional $240,000 of reductions to our school district budget, thereby making up the gap.

It must be stated that additional state aid also became available after the Governor released the state budget, which was not included previously. Because of the budget compromise, and the fact that the Commissioner of Education agreed to increase the school district’s 1/12th allocation, we were able to bring back the sports and activities and the 4 administrators that were laid off.

I believe that the current budget that the Commissioner of Education set for our school district under guidance from Massachusetts General Laws will be maintained for the remainder of the year, but that is not certain. One of the reasons that Rehoboth continues to have trouble finalizing the school budget is the way that the assessments for the two towns are calculated per the regional agreement and the wealth factor formula that the state follows when we send our assessments to each town. It is pretty clear that the regional agreement between the towns of Rehoboth and Dighton is outdated. The assessment piece in the regional agreement is wherein the problem lies between the two towns. The fundamental question is: How do we assess properly and fairly?”

Please remember that in 2014 a task force was created by the regional school district to study how chapter 70 monies were to be distributed between the two towns. It was during this task force that it was widely accepted that the Town of Dighton was paying roughly $1.5 million more since 2007 in their assessment in which the Town of Rehoboth should have been paying instead.

Therefore, in 2014, when this miscalculation was discovered, 7 years later, the Town of Rehoboth was then asked to pay the difference and since then the budget has been contentious and has created angst for the school district, the town and all of our stakeholders. Recently, the Town of Rehoboth BOS has appointed a new liaison between the schools and town to help repair the divisiveness that the budget issue has created and to improve communication going forward. Selectman Mike Costello will be charged with bridging the informational gap between the school committee and the board of selectmen in Rehoboth. He replaces School Committee person, George Solas.

Our hope, with Mr. Costello on board, is that, going into the FY 2021 budget season, we will be in a very good place to make sure the town and the school district has an understanding, that before we go into town meeting, that we’re all on the same page.

Sincerely,
Dr. Azar
Supt. of Schools
Dighton-Rehoboth Regional School District