Share This Article
Sudbury’s Annual Town Meeting in 2025 featured an early motion to amend Article 3, the operating budget. The amendment proposed to move $200,000 from the Reserve Fund to the Vocational Education budget. The vocational education budget is set based on the number of Sudbury students enrolled in a vocational district, but the amendment was presented as a means to demonstrate Sudbury’s commitment to vocational education, but Town Manager Andy Sheehan told the hall that there was a better way to do that than the method proposed by the amendment. The amendment failed 46-228.
Nearly five months later, Sheehan is making good on his recommendation to Town Meeting. On Tuesday, September 30, he provided an update to the Select Board on Sudbury’s efforts to seek membership in a vocational education district. In a memo to the board, Sheehan said:
“I plan to propose at the May 2026 Town Meeting the establishment of a special purpose Vocational Education Stabilization Fund. The Vocational Education Stabilization Fund would be built up gradually through annual appropriations.”
While no vocational district has offered Sudbury the opportunity to join, the consensus opinion of Town leadership is that it will require a hefty entrance fee, particularly because Sudbury withdrew from the Minuteman district roughly a decade ago. Sheehan’s memo added “The challenge of securing membership in a vocational school is likely to be protracted. Most vocational schools are at or near capacity, and most have more students interested in attending than seats available. The bar for Sudbury may be higher because of its decision a decade ago to withdraw from Minuteman Regional Vocational Technical High School. In addition, membership is likely to come with a significant expense to the Town.” (Page 84)
In order to fund that fee, Sheehan proposed setting a target balance. “I recommend a funding target of 2% of the prior fiscal year’s general fund operating budget. The funds can be used to pay a buy-in fee for admission into a district. If the buy-in fee is less than the balance in the fund, any surplus funds can be applied toward annual operating assessments or any other purpose allowed by statute.”
The Details
During discussion, it was made clear that Free Cash would be the likely source of capital for the new fund, should Town Meeting approve it. While there has been some hand-wringing on boards and committees about strong free cash performance in the last two fiscal years, the proposed funding strategy for a vocational education stabilization fund could take a big chunk out of free cash until the account reaches the target of approximately $2.6 million.
The Division of Local Services recommends aiming for free cash equivalent to five-to-seven percent of the operating budget, so building up an account that’s equivalent to a quarter or a third of a given year’s target free cash represents a significant commitment given Sudbury’s dependence (historically) on free cash to fund capital projects. Even then, as member Dan Carty pointed out, the balance at any given time is unlikely to cover an entire entrance fee to a district.
Most of the members of the Select Board signaled general support for the concept, but no votes were taken.
The proposal will come back to them during the process of submitting warrant articles for Annual Town Meeting in December and January, and will likely be subject to further deliberation during those meetings.
While the board was broadly supportive, Member Charlie Russo voiced concern about the proposal.
“So I like the homework that you’ve done, I do appreciate it. You definitely have thought about this, and it’s a good plan, but because it is so speculative, and we have so many needs, I’m going to take convincing to get on board with this.”
Tradeoffs
Russo’s concerns had to do with the fact that there’s no known path back into a vocational district at this time, and a vocational district would fully control any decision to invite a Town like Sudbury to join. He also questioned if funding the stabilization fund would come at the expense of funding needed staff positions in the Town.
Vice Chair Janie Dretler interjected to clarify that this account would likely be funded by free cash, and Sheehan confirmed as much. Free cash is not generally used to fund the operating budget, which includes funds for staff salaries. The Division of Local Services advises strongly against that practice, because free cash is one-time funding whereas staff salaries are ongoing operating expenses. In short, it’s a risky practice.
Russo later pointed to capital projects as an example tradeoff when funding the proposed stabilization fund, alluding to the upcoming presentation of a new 15-year capital plan. He voiced a desire to set a shot clock for the stabilization fund, so that it could be used for capital or other needs if years pass and a vocational district hasn’t offered a path in for Sudbury. “I hope that, you know, if and when the stabilization account is formed, we set some parameters for when is it going to expire. You know, how long are we going to hold it?”
Chair Lisa Kouchakdjian voiced enthusiasm for the proposal throughout the discussion, and member Dan Carty was also supportive while calling for further discussion and fine tuning of the proposal in the next few months. With four members indicating support, at least in concept, and a fifth remaining open to convincing, residents can reasonably expect to see this item turned into a warrant article for the 2026 Annual Town Meeting.
