Newton Mayor Ruthanne Fuller rejected Superintendent Anna Nolin’s request for a $14.9 million funding increase for Newton Public Schools (NPS) next year at the first of several budget meetings on Monday evening.
NPS operated with a budget of $282,647,007 for the 2025 fiscal year (FY). Nolin’s proposed plan exceeds the city’s proposed allocation of $292.96 million from February, which included a $10.3 million increase, or 3.65 percent, over the 2025 NPS budget.
Nolin’s proposed $14.9 million increase represents a 5.26 percent increase over that FY25 budget.
In 2025–26, NPS is projected to serve approximately 11,700 students across its preschool, 15 elementary schools, four middle schools, two high schools, two alternative high school programs, and out-of-district special education schools.
In Fuller’s newsletter update last Friday, she said the proposed budget for NPS was unreasonable.
“I believe that perhaps for the first time in Newton’s history, the Superintendent of the Newton Public Schools is not proposing a balanced budget for the coming year,” Fuller wrote.
Fuller said the city must make room in its budget for services other than education.
“The Superintendent is recommending that the School Committee send to the Mayor a budget with aspirational spending levels that would force us to cut other critical services or jeopardize the financial security and resiliency of the City of Newton and the Newton Public Schools,” Fuller wrote.
Nolin explained that her team was asked to propose ways to reduce the deficit, but she did not want to present those NPS budgets to the school committee.
“Not one of them is recommended by me and the team,” said Nolin. “I don’t want these to come to pass, as they compromise our movement towards program shifts and support and staffing that we need to come close to.”
Nolin instead suggested a level-services-plus budget, meaning the district maintains all of its current services with a few additions. She emphasized that while the budget exceeds allocated funds, extra money is necessary to meet students’ needs and goals.
“This is a zero-based budgeting process, which means we don’t simply roll over last year’s budget, add a percentage and present that to the school committee, but actually started from zero and built it from the ground up,” said Nolin. “We needed to look at things with fresh eyes and a newly constructed central office team to really examine every penny that we’re spending.”
The original budgetary requests across the various departments totaled $18 million in additional funds, a number administrators negotiated down over time, according to Nolin.
“What do all good principals and sector leaders do?” said Nolin. “They told the whole story of all the things they desire for the system. It is our job as a central team to funnel those requests and sift through them into a more manageable number while moving forward to address the needs of the school system and build a budget that moves us from surviving to thriving.”
After this collaboration, many departments could keep their costs neutral, explained Nolin.
“The Human Resources office has found efficiencies and ways to create better services at a lower cost and has been able to replace other services and retire subscriptions and things of that nature, making their complete restructure cost-neutral to the system,” said Nolin. “So, too, has our English Language Learning Department.”
Nolin explained that her department is well aware of the other public services the city must balance.
“We know that we live in a municipal ecosystem that provides many city services, and to that end, we feel that we have to balance the needs of our brother and sister city departments, and I recommend to you … very few additions to advance our educational expectations,” said Nolin.
Moreover, Nolin emphasized that NPS’ reliance on the Educational Stabilization Account, a temporary funding source, highlights the need for a long-term, sustainable funding strategy.
Nolin explained that the district will propose longer-term recurring revenue options to further reduce the funding deficit.
“We have also done our part to increase efficiencies and revenue, realizing additional savings and efficiencies of $770,959 in FY25 and $739,000 projected in FY26,” said Nolin. “These efficiencies are in addition to almost $2 million of further reductions and redeployments necessary to reduce the budget gap.”
A large part of the funding issue is statewide and not exclusive to NPS, explained Nolin, calling the current situation a “statewide perfect storm for funding deficits.”
“The statewide landscape itself is underfunding our Circuit Breaker and special education transportation reimbursement, and Chapter 70 state-based education funding is not keeping promise with what was expected in the recent budget, campaigns, and promises under the Student Opportunities Act,” said Nolin.
Fuller countered that the city and school budgets combined can increase no more than $22.3 million in FY26, so the $14.9 million increase for the schools alone is too great.
“It is simply impossible for me to responsibly honor the request from the NPS administration for a $14.9 million increase in the NPS budget for next year,” said Fuller. “The decision on the increase for NPS of $10.3 million for FY26 did not come lightly. It did not come easily. It did not come without a tremendous amount of thought. The increase is based on the financial realities facing the entire city of Newton.”
Further NPS budgetary meetings are set to be held on March 12, 17, and 19. The final meeting will be preceded by a public hearing.
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