Hadley Lays Off 12 Employees to Close Budget Gap
As of last Thursday, the Town of Hadley closed its $1.48 million budget gap by losing a net of 6 full positions and laying off 12 employees. The cuts are also anticipated to impact funding for public schools and other town departments.
The town of Hadley’s budget gap — an expected total of $1.48 million, for the fiscal year 2027 (FY27) beginning July 1 — has officially been closed and balanced.
In an email to The Student, Town of Hadley Treasurer Linda Sanderson stated that the town “will be losing a net of six full positions from the town side, impacting about 12 employees, as several of the positions are part-time.” Sanderson also explained that the instability of this year’s economy means that “the cuts [could] run even deeper, impacting town and school services and programs across every department.”
The town’s expected revenue for 2027 of $22.37 million was $385,572 short of the projected $22.76 million for 2026, causing the initial budget gap. One of the biggest cost drivers was the health insurance and retiree benefits line, which increased by $1.5 million from fiscal year 2025, according to the Daily Hampshire Gazette. After applying $846,785 towards closing this year’s budget gap, Hadley is short on additional funds to close the gap for next year.
“Over the course of the last year or so, we have … had to increase our budget prior to the start of [fiscal year 2026] … and now we are preparing for another increase in FY27,” Interim Town Administrator of Hadley Michael Mason said. “We are estimating over a million dollars in just health insurance increases for the Town of Hadley over that time.”
According to Sanderson, the increases in health insurance and retirement benefits were also larger than the increases in the entire town’s budget over the past two years — with these expenditures coming in at around $1.33 million in 2024 and $1.1 million in 2025, respectively. This means that in order to accommodate the insurance and benefits increases, the rest of the budget needed to be cut by the difference of $230,000.
After an initial request in September for a tax-cap override — which would allow the town to permanently increase property taxes — failed to gain voter approval, the town’s Select Board had been reaching out to residents since January to set the stage for a second override request, Mason said. In addition, the town hosted multiple listening sessions where residents submitted proposals to address the budget gap.
Mason added that the town took other measures previous to the most recent actions to mitigate budget impacts after the first override’s failure, including eliminating nine vacant positions and laying off two firefighters in October. In a then-article by Mass Priorities, Fire Chief Michael Spanknebel, expressed concern over the town’s ability to maintain public safety, and shared that the fire department still faced a shortfall of $107,000 after the layoffs.
Hadley’s next fiscal year remains unclear. Sanderson added that there might be additional cuts at the public schools to appease school budget pressures. As of now, she said, school leaders’ plans for adjusting to their lowered budget figure are unknown.
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