Williamstown Community Preservation Panel Weighs Hike in Tax Surcharge
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Community Preservation Committee is considering whether to ask town meeting to increase the property tax surcharge that property owners currently pay under the provisions of the Community Preservation Act.
Members of the committee have argued that by raising the surcharge to the maximum allowed under the CPA, the town would be eligible for significantly more "matching" funds from the commonwealth to support CPA-eligible projects in community housing, historic preservation and open space and recreation.
When the town adopted the provisions of the CPA in 2002 and ever since, it set the surcharge at 2 percent of a property's tax with $100,000 of the property's valuation exempted.
For example, the median-priced single-family home in the current fiscal year has a value of $453,500 and a tax bill of $6,440, before factoring the assessment from the fire district, a separate taxing authority.
For the purposes of the CPA, that same median-priced home would be valued at $353,500, and its theoretical tax bill would be $5,020.
That home's CPA surcharge would be about $100 (2 percent of $5,020).
If the CPA surcharge was 3 percent in FY26, that median-priced home's surcharge would be about $151 (3 percent of $5,020).
The Community Preservation Committee is the body that each year vets applications for CPA grants and recommends grants that then get an up or down vote at town meeting in May.
In the last couple of years, the CPC has seen funding requested — by non-profits or Town Hall — far exceed the CPA funds available. Those funds are generated by the local surcharge and state matching funds.
In consultation with the Boston-based Community Preservation Coalition, the local committee has learned that the state match varies, dramatically, based on the level at which a municipality sets its CPA surcharge.
How dramatically will depend on two things: the number of towns and cities that implement a 3 percent surcharge and the total dollar amount of state funds allocated to the CPA program in a given year.
But based on the most recent data available, the town would have nearly doubled its CPA "pie" had its surcharge been 50 percent higher than 2 percent, the committee learned last week.
"Here's what I can tell you," said member Alison Bost, who worked with representatives from the Boston non-profit coalition. "Under fiscal year 2024 numbers, when we had a 2 percent surcharge, the local revenue was about $319,000. We got a match from the state of roughly $57,000. Our total was $376,000 for money to distribute. The state match was 18 percent.
"If we had had a 3 percent match, then our revenue from local [taxpayers] would have been $478,000. And we would have gotten a lot more state match. … The total of local plus state match under a 3 percent surcharge in FY24 would have been $670,000."
The state each year has several rounds of funding for purposes of matching the local CPA collections. Towns and cities with a 3 percent surcharge are eligible for rounds of funding that towns like Williamstown (at 2 percent) are not.
"So we're clearly leaving money on the table by having less than the maximum [surcharge] allowed under the statute," Boat told her colleagues. "We would have had a 40 percent match from the state if we were at 3 percent.
"I think it's important to think about this in the context of the applications we have this year that far exceed the funds available."
Some members of the committee said it could be difficult to convince town meeting members to increase the CPA assessment at a time when the cost of municipal services already is on the rise and stagnant growth in the tax base drives up the demand on existing property owners.
Others pointed out that the case for bringing in more state matching funds would be compelling, particularly when some of the CPA projects under consideration this year — a renovation of the Broad Brook Park play areas and a new skate park on town-owned land — address needs that otherwise would be funded by local tax dollars.
Committee members Nate Budington and Molly Magavern both said they were leaning toward putting the surcharge increase question before town meeting.
"We're pretty high impact," Budington said, referring to the town projects that have been funded by the CPA over the years. "We give the best case we can and hope for the best. The worst that can happen is we end up where we began."
CPC Chair Philip McKnight said that the committee would try to reach a decision at its Feb. 4 meeting, in time to get the ball rolling on an article that can be included on the warrant for the May meeting.
Tags: CPA,
