Most voters in the ConVal school district will see a decrease in the local education portion of their December tax bill as a result of the recent decision by the ConVal School Board regarding distribution of the unreserved fund balance from fiscal year 2024-2025.
“The ConVal School board has voted to return $3, 318, 451 to taxpayers across all nine ConVal towns for fiscal year 2026,” said Jim Fredrickson, school board representative from Sharon and chair of the Budget and Property Committee. “Most towns will see a decrease in their tax bill.”
ConVal’s total tax assessment will be $46,000 less than last year, or a decrease of .09%.
Local education tax assessments vary from town to town based on enrollment, equalized property value and the amount of funds each town received from the statewide education property tax, or SWEPT, tax and adequacy grants.
According to Fredrickson, townwide property reassessments can also impact the allocation of local education tax.
“Most towns in the ConVal district will see a decrease in their bill as a result of the funds being returned,” he said.
ConVal’s unassigned fund balance is used in three ways: to fund the district’s capital reserve funds, including for energy projects and building maintenance; to retain for emergencies and to offset the amount that must be raised by property taxes.
In March, ConVal voters approved transferring $925,000 to the district’s Building Capital Reserve and the Energy and Efficiency Funds.
“After funds are transferred to the capital reserve funds each year, the board must decide how to split the rest between funds retained and funds returned to the taxpayers. Retentions of funds was not an option until a few years ago,” Fredrickson said.
In March 2021, after the state changed the regulations regarding retention of funds during the COVID pandemic, ConVal district voters approved retention of the maximum amount allowed by the state, which was up to 5% of the current fiscal year’s net assessment.
Later in 2021, the ConVal School Board approved a policy that limited the maximum retention in the district to 2.5% of the total budget.
In 2025, ConVal voters approved retaining 2.5% of the total fund balance, or $1,212,827, for emergencies.
“We are proud we can say ConVal has not spent any of the retained funds from the past two years,” Fredrickson said. “These funds are for real emergencies, such as a building collapse during a snowstorm, a significant unanticipated loss revenue or something like that. Hopefully we will never have a need to use any of the funds we retain each year. In any case, they could not be expended without a public hearing.”
According to ConVal Business Administrator Neal Cass, ConVal’s unreserved fund balance is a result of budgeted expenses costing less than anticipated, revenue to the district coming in higher than anticipated and balance of the retained funds from the year before.
Increased revenue in the district in 2024-2025 year included tuition for preschool, tuition received for special education, special education assistance and vocational education aid.
“More revenue came in than we were expecting this year,” Cass said. “As we go into the new budget season, we will be looking at all of this very carefully. With changes that have already been made to the current year budget, the surplus is not likely to be this high moving forward.”
Cass, a Hancock resident, joined the district in June 2025. Formerly, Cass had served as the town administrator of Hopkinton. For more information about the ConVal School Board go to schoolboard.conval.edu/en-US.