Deerfield voters likely to consider override to fund Senior Center, EMS budgets

DEERFIELD — With a tough budget year ahead, Deerfield officials are discussing the need for an override to afford South County Senior Center and South County EMS budget hikes.

Although Assistant Town Administrator Greg Snedeker said the general budget numbers for fiscal year 2027 are not yet finalized and will be solidified at the next joint Finance Committee and Select Board meetings on April 6 and 13, an increase is expected.

“It’s a tough year for a lot of towns,” Town Administrator Christopher Dunne said in a phone interview on Thursday.

Dunne traced the majority of the increase to rising health insurance costs, which will account for at least an extra $300,000 in FY27. According to Snedeker, the increase covers the planned FY27 rate increase of 12.48% for Hampshire County Group Insurance Trust (HCGIT) members, the midyear rate increase of 20% that took effect in October and the 18% hike that the town faced heading into fiscal year 2026.

At last fall’s special Town Meeting, voters approved transferring $75,550 to the health insurance account, pulling $15,550 from free cash, $30,000 from general highway payroll and $30,000 from the recreation director’s salary line to address the midyear hike in health insurance costs.

To fund this jump, along with increases in the South County Senior Center and South County EMS budgets, the preliminary annual Town Meeting warrant includes two articles that would allow residents to vote for overrides that would fund the Senior Center and South County EMS budget increases.

One article entails an override that would fund the Senior Center’s relocation to the 12,000-square-foot office building at 112 Amherst Road in Sunderland. According to Dunne, the override amount would cover the difference between Deerfield’s share of the Senior Center’s budget if it remained at 22 Amherst Road and the cost of the proposed new location. Based on estimates presented in March, this would come to about $103,700.

The draft warrant also includes a separate proposed override to fund the increase in the South County EMS budget. Snedeker said the dollar amount for the proposed override has not yet been finalized.

According to South County EMS Chief Joshua Sparks, the purchase of a $325,000 ambulance, which Deerfield voters approved at the October special Town Meeting, led to this increase, along with cost-of-living adjustments, health insurance rates and “indirect costs to the town of Deerfield.”

To help offset the increase, expenses that are not related to staffing have been reduced from previous years, leading to a level-services budget that “does not allow for expansion or improvement of services,” Sparks said.

To plan for future improvements with high price tags, another article proposes establishing a capital stabilization fund for South County EMS. Instead of Deerfield, Sunderland and Whately funding these changes through free cash or increased shares of the South County EMS budget, the stabilization fund would build up money to pay for these projects.

“It would be nice to correct the structural defect that is the [South County EMS] budget, because right now, we don’t raise and appropriate tax money to pay for public safety function; we rely on the fact that we might have free cash to pay for it,” Selectboard member Tim Hilchey said at Wednesday’s meeting.

“The money will be there when we need to buy medical equipment and ambulances,” Hilchey added. “It’s a good idea to prevent us from playing fast and loose.”

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