The rising cost of education led a number of Maine communities — including districts in Lewiston, Westbrook, Wales and Oxford Hills — to vote down their local school budgets this week.
For Lewiston, the vote represented the second school budget rejection this year.
Steve Bailey, the executive director of the Maine School Management Association, said he can't remember a year in which so many budgets were rejected.
Bailey said many districts struggled to keep budget increases below 10% this year, as many faced rising costs to pay for salaries, special education, transportation, and the state's new family and medical leave law.
Schools also faced the expiration of federal COVID relief money that had funded many new positions.
"People had been kind of anticipating, well, what's the cliff gonna be like, when the federal money goes away," Bailey said. "So this was the year that people were dreading in terms of both preparing a budget and getting a budget past voters."
In Lewiston, school officials said that they may consider cutting some positions that had been previously funded by federal COVID relief money, including a family liaison and two reading interventionists.
Superintendent Jake Langlais said after-school programming will also be up for discussion.
"It's really hard when you're cutting after-school programs that support kids that have needs, or reading interventionists. You know, it's hard to look at the things you are paying for and say, 'Okay, well, which ones make the most sense?'" Langlais said.
Langlais attributed the rejection of the school budget to many voters being unable to handle tax increases at a time when the cost of living is also rising.
