The Glocester Town Council and the town's school committee held a joint special meeting on Wednesday, July 29, to work through three straight years of school-side deficits, with the state's auditor general present to explain what state law does and does not require of the town.
No votes were taken beyond a motion to adjourn, which passed by voice vote. The session was a working discussion, not a decision meeting, and several of the numbers presented were openly described as unconfirmed pending the annual audit.
The numbers on the table
The council president opened by citing audited financial statements and district budget documents. He said the K-through-5 district closed 2024 with a net operating deficit of $306,000 and 2025 with a deficit of $229,355. He said the district overspent its adopted budget by $896,552 in 2024 and by $627,732.32 in 2025, driven largely by special education and fringe benefits, and that a shortfall of roughly $300,000 in local appropriations is projected for 2026.
Local sponsorAffordable photography lessons in Newport, Jamestown, or your town.E.L. Photo RIHe also said no correction plan was produced for either of the past two deficits, despite repeated council requests, and pointed to Article 8, Section 4 of the town's Home Rule Charter, which he said uses the word "shall."
The superintendent disputed the framing that the problem is only two or three years old. She said she reviewed audits back to 2016 and found the school department in deficit in all but one year, and noted four consecutive years — 2016 through 2019 — in which the local appropriation did not increase at all. She said enrollment has stayed roughly flat over that period, at 550 students in 2016–17 and 547 this past year, with 536 projected for 2026–27.
What has already been cut
The superintendent said the district cut to meet its approved budget by laying off four teachers and not renewing a retired teacher. Three of the four have been recalled and one is on a leave of absence. The district is currently down a full-time special educator and four part-time positions: art, music, health, and a reading specialist. She said the superintendent's own salary line was reduced from $60,000 to $30,000.
Asked repeatedly what else could be cut, she said there was nothing left, and that roughly 90 to 95 percent of the school budget is payroll and benefits.
There was also a factual correction on the record. The council president's draft plan used $7.7 million as the local appropriation baseline. The superintendent said the figure approved by voters was $7,964,105 — about $85,000 more than the prior year — and that building a five-year plan off the lower number would start from a flawed foundation.
The auditor general's assessment
The state auditor general, who said he has held the post since 2023, distinguished between an operating deficit, which happens in a single year, and a cumulative deficit, which means a fund balance has gone negative and legally triggers immediate corrective action. He said it is not yet certain whether Glocester's school fund is in a cumulative deficit as of June 30, and advised the town to let the audit determine the number.
He described the letter he sent Glocester as not highly critical, and said the district's pressures — special education, transportation, and health insurance — match what he is seeing statewide. He noted Glocester has historically filed its audits on time, which he said fewer than 30 percent of Rhode Island municipalities manage by the December 31 deadline.
His stated concern was staffing, not spending. He called the town's vacant finance director position bad timing and said an inability to hire capable finance directors is the single biggest driver of municipal financial trouble he sees. He also said state law allows five years to eliminate a deficit once an audit finalizes it, and recommended the town and schools jointly build and review a five-year financial plan rather than budgeting one year at a time.
That framing sat somewhat awkwardly beside the charter language the council president cited earlier. Asked directly whether it is acceptable to run a deficit that conflicts with the charter, the auditor general did not endorse it, but said districts face legal minimum service requirements and contractual obligations that costs must follow.
Special education, busing, and the things the district cannot control
Much of the discussion centered on costs the district said it learns about after its budget is set. One out-of-district placement can cost $90,000, a school official said, and placements ordered through state child welfare arrive without district input. Transportation rates for out-of-district students are set at the state level; officials said last year's rates arrived in August, after the budget passed in May.
The superintendent described a proposal to build an in-district special education program using an existing behavior specialist, with the aim of bringing outplaced students back and cutting both tuition and transportation costs. She said returning even one student could cover the program's first-year cost, though she said she could not confirm that.
Two residents raised concerns about that idea during public comment. One, who identified himself as a former school committee member, urged the district to design any program with capacity for multiple students and to market seats to neighboring districts. Another speaker, who said she has worked as a nurse at a residential school, warned that students placed for behavioral and trauma-related reasons can require staffing and safety measures that carry their own costs.
On busing, officials said the state legislature's prevailing wage requirement for bus drivers will raise driver pay from roughly $25 to about $32 an hour, and that the district's current contractor told them it could not absorb it. The current contract expires next June with a one-year extension option, and officials said the contractor has asked to reopen it. Officials said alternatives would cost more.
Public comment: the fund balance question
The sharpest criticism came from residents. One former school committee member said roughly $1 million returned to the district after a health insurance change was spent covering deficits rather than reserved, and called that the start of the problem. He said using fund balance to close a deficit simply moves the hole into the next year, and said the charter bars spending money that was not appropriated.
Another resident said using fund balance is not a corrective action plan at all — that a real plan means permanent, structural cost reductions. He argued the council and committee should consider a salary and step-increase freeze, and said he had given up his own stipend when he pushed for that elsewhere.
A resident also said a town council meeting in January heard a warning from the finance director that a deficit was coming after laid-off teacher assistants were recalled without a financial impact statement.
What happens next
The council and school committee agreed informally to meet again on a quarterly basis rather than waiting until January, with the first follow-up likely after the town hires a finance director. Officials said interviews for that position had not yet begun.
Action items named at the close: confirming whether the district is capturing the maximum available state high-cost special education aid, and a commitment from the auditor general's office to ask the state education department why Glocester's state aid dropped substantially in 2026 and 2027. The audit that will determine the actual 2026 deficit is due December 31.
A charter revision that would require the school department to have its own business manager is expected to go before voters in November. Officials estimated the position could cost six figures, and no one at the table said where that money would come from. A school committee member also raised putting regionalization on a future ballot; the council president said the council has not discussed it and that it would be too large a lift for November.