FLORIDA, Mass. — The North Berkshire School Union voted to give member town Clarksburg a financial breather — at least for fiscal 2027.

 

Town and school officials had proposed changes last month as the town's assessment for the union administration climbed to 54 percent.

 

The "super" School Committee, after more than an hour of debate, voted 7-2 to raise the other four member towns' assessments by 2 percent, thus giving Clarksburg an 8 percent reduction.

 

Clarksburg officials had initially brought forward a proposal to set a base percentage for all the towns at 10 percent, with 5 percent for tiny Monroe, and then do the balance based on the current enrollment apportionment.

 

This was rejected by consensus and other proposals were hashed out at a recent subcommittee meeting. The 2 percent change was brought forward to Thursday's joint committee meeting, which is comprised of all the members of the town school committees.

 

"I do think it's important to come up with some sort of compromise, but I also believe that there's a lot of data that we need to start looking into throughout this one-year agreement that's going to help with a lot of these questions," said Savoy's Arleigh Cooper.

 

"I know that there's hesitation. We all looked at numbers at 10 percent at 5 percent I think there was maybe a 7.5 percent or maybe that was just my numbers on my own that I was calculating and even giving a small 2.5 percent for just a one year, I think shows Clarksburg, hey, we are willing to help you out. However, there's so much data that needs to be collected, and it's just too short of a window to do a large number."