Newton Mayor Ruthanne Fuller Presents FY 2023 Budget

NEWTON, MA — Newton Mayor Ruthanne Fuller presented the city’s Fiscal Year 2023 budget on Tuesday, outlining the proposal for how funding will be allocated next year.

"Together, we will move forward to achieve our shared goals which include excellent schools, first-rate public safety, outstanding services, better streets and sidewalks, new and renovated school buildings, up-to-date facilities, climate action, and a vibrant, inclusive community,” Fuller said.

The proposed FY 2023 budget calls for a $480 million Operating Budget, a $61 million Water, Sewer and Stormwater fund, and $5.6 million Community Preservation fund. This includes $262 million for the newton Public Schools

This reflects an increase in the Operating Budget from last year of $17.3 million and includes $262 million for the Newton Public Schools, which is a nearly $9 million increase from last year.

Fuller said the city continues to face soft revenues in many important areas. Newton’s largest portion of state aid, $25.9 million, is for education and only increased 1.88 percent for the upcoming year. In addition, the city’s Unrestricted General Government Aid, at $6.2 million, only grew by 2.7 percent.

Newton is also also seeing lower revenues than before the pandemic in rooms and meals taxes, motor vehicle excise taxes, parking meter and ticket collections, and interest income on our investments, said Fuller. The city estimates these losses to be close to $3.9 million and will use $3 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to bring its revenues to $480 million.

"What a different place we are in now not just from the early days of the pandemic but from five years ago,” said Fuller. "We continue to make progress on programs and initiatives prioritized by my Administration ̶ diversity, equity and inclusion, translation and interpretation services, an energy coach and action steps from a Climate Action Plan, and traffic calming, to name a few."

"As a City Budget is a reflection of our values, this Budget prioritizes our people, our places, and our future,” she continued.

Here are a few highlights of the mayor’s presentation:

Newton Public Schools

Fuller said Newton Public Schools (NPS) are a priority in the budget, despite months of controversy with the School Committee and residents. While the city's other departments, including Police, Fire, Health & Human Services, Public Works, Parks, Recreation & Culture, and the Library, are seeing their budgets increase by only 3 percent or $4.2 million, Fuller said NPS will receive a larger increase of 3.5 percent or $8.9 million.

In addition, of Newton's $7.8 million in federal CARES Act funds, 82 percent or $6.4 million has been allocated to NPS to support the health and safety of students, educators, and staff. An additional $16 million from the city’s ARPA funds has been directed to the district and $1.7 million from other sources, including EMA, free cash, the operating budget and cannabis host community agreement funds.

Department of Public Works

The FY 2023 budget includes a new DPW initiative to save money and improve service by bringing yard waste collection in-house, said Fuller. This is because the contractor struggles last year to collect yard waste on schedule. Now the Newton DPW will rent trucks and hire a collection team and the city expects to save several hundred dollars through this effort. Newton has also shifted waste and recycling pickup from parks and village centers over to DPW’s Sustainable Materials Management team to be more efficient.

Affordable Housing

The budget also includes funding to expand affordable housing. Newton has selected a development team to provide deeply affordable housing at the West Newton Armory and will add a Housing Program Manager position to expand its efforts for the development of new affordable and mixed-use housing. One early action item will be to move forward with the transformation of the Walker Center properties into long-term affordable housing.

Economic Development

Included in the budget is funding for economic development efforts. The mayor mentioned the two major developments at Northland and Riverside and said the city must pay close attention to special and comprehensive permits. Therefore, Newton is adding a Deputy Chief Planner for Current Projects position in the Planning Department to coordinate the building permit review process for large projects with Councilors, residents, consultants, and staff across city departments and track compliance through the NewGov system. The Inspectional Services Department will supplement its resources with specialized inspectors and charge the costs for them back to Northland and Riverside. What gets built must match the conditions specified by the City Council and its Land Use Committee.

Retiree Liabilities

The budget also contains funding for long-term retiree liabilities. The city’s long-term pension and retiree health insurance obligations currently exceed $1 billion and is on schedule with its strategy for the next two decades, fully funding pensions by FY2030 and retiree health care by FY2045. This translates into a 9.6 percent year-over-year increase into the pension fund for a total of $52 million.

For more information on Newton’s FY 2023 budget, click here.