WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The town manager is proposing to make the town's support of non-profit agencies – if any – part of the regular town budget instead of a special town meeting article as decided in years past.

 

But however that financial aid is generated, the town is facing some tough decisions about whether and how much support to give.

 

Historically, town meeting voters have supported allocations to several different non-profits with allotments from the town's free cash reserves.

 

In May 2024, for example, the meeting OK'd $55,000 in taxpayer money for the Williamstown Chamber of Commerce, $50,000 for the Williamstown Youth Center and $50,000 for the Williamstown Community Preschool in the fiscal year that began July 1, 2024.

 

That $155,000 is different from the Community Preservation Act funds that non-profits annually seek to address specific projects.

 

Unlike the CPA, which allows towns to use a property tax surcharge to generate funds for specific projects in historic preservation, community housing and open space and recreation, the money for groups like the Chamber comes from free cash (technically, the General Unreserved Fund Balance), which is the result of expenses that fall short of budgeted amounts and revenues that surpass expectations in any given year.

 

Town Manager Robert Menicocci last week told the Finance Committee that best practices dictate that free cash should not be used for "recurring" expenses, like allocations to non-profits that the town routinely makes.

 

Rather, Menicocci built a draft FY26 budget that moves those allocations "on budget" so they factor into the tax levy in any given year.

 

In the budget he presented last week, he left a placeholder number of $200,000 for the contracts that the town has signed in the past with non-profit organizations.

 

But moving the non-profit support "on budget" is not the issue with which the Fin Comm will have to grapple in the coming weeks.

 

"I think we'll have a healthy conversation around what that's all about," Menicocci told the panel during its first look at the FY26 spending plan. "We had quite a number of applications this year. So I think we really need to think through what our philosophy is on that."

 

In fact, the town has heard from eight different non-profits seeking funding this budget cycle, including the three town meeting supported last year and two that are concurrently seeking CPA funds in FY26.

 

The Williamstown Community Preschool is seeking $50,000, the same amount it has received the last three years, which amounts to 4 percent of its operating expenses. The Williamstown Chamber of Commerce is seeking $55,000 (40 percent of its annual expenses). And the Youth Center is asking for $50,000, about 8 percent of its operating budget.

 

Sand Springs Recreation Center, which did not receive funding from town meeting in FY5, the current fiscal year, is seeking $50,000 in FY26, which would be about 23 percent of the organization's budget, according to its application.

 

New for FY26 are four non-profits:

 

Images Cinema, seeking $50,000 (8.6 percent of its operating expenses), specifically to support its outdoor movie series and other programming to keep Images active during an upcoming renovation.

 

The Williamstown Farmers Market, seeking $10,000, or about 20 percent of its operating expenses.

 

Remedy Hall, a non-profit agency founded in 2023 and dedicated to providing daily essentials – other than food – for area residents in need, is asking for $50,000, which would support a new $100,000 budget that would include a paid executive director position and a move to a larger home.

 

Purple Valley Trails is asking for $150,000 toward a $750,000 budget (20 percent) to build a new skate park on Stetson Road.

 

Both Purple Valley Trails and Images Cinema received support from the town's Community Preservation Committee, which is sending articles to town meeting asking it to give allocations of CPA funds for those groups.

 

The FY26 requests total $465,000 – well more than double the $200,000 line item in Menicocci's draft budget.

 

At last Wednesday's Fin Comm meeting, the town manager did not spell out exactly how he wants the panel to resolve the shortfall. In answer to an email from iBerkshires.com seeking comment, he elaborated.

 

"I would be looking for any advice they would want to offer in the context that would be a transition year where the process would change and I want to be open to hearing from them what they are comfortable with," Menicocci wrote.

 

The committee, which has non-profit funding listed as an agenda item for its Wednesday, Feb. 26 meeting, began the conversation last week.

 

"My take on this is Bob has described a pretty bleak picture for the budget for this year and the near future," Chair Fred Puddester said. "What I'm hearing in the media and listening to school board meetings is their situation is even worse. I'm not sure I want to be close to the bone on town budgets and cutting school budgets to fund non-profits."

 

Puddester stressed that his is just one opinion, but he would rather see areas like public schools and public works fully funded before adding new non-profits to the town's funding stream.

 

"Funding a non-profit, while great if we have lots of money, kind of falls low on the list for me, as opposed to teachers in our high school or dispatchers for 911 or people staffing the library," he said.

 

Fin Comm member Michael Sussman argued that tax dollars spent on supporting non-profits can be an investment on the part of the town.

 

"I can make a very, very strong argument that every dollar you send to the [preschool] probably saves the school – elementary and high school – $5 to $10 on remedial services," Sussman said. "That's just an example. I am very concerned about pulling out support for some non-profits that we have been supporting for many years."

 

Paula Consolini made a similar point.

 

"It's been my understanding that part of the reason we funded a number of these entities in the past was because they were doing things that a town would otherwise do," Consolini said. "So, with the Youth Center, we don't have a recreation budget, so we were giving money to a on-profit to ensure there was this kind of programming."

 

"Schools are a high priority. When you think about other components of what a town should provide, what are the other elements? What do the non-profits contribute to this? It's not that all of them don't contribute in some great way to the vitality of the community. It's a question of what the government can do with limited resources."

 

Suzanne Stinson said the conversation about prioritizing allocations to non-profits goes well with Menicocci's decision to put those allocations into the regular town budget rather than relying on free cash.

 

"It's not at the end of the process saying, ‘Oh, we have this much left in free funds and we usually give it to these places,' " Stinson said. "I think this is an attempt, a very good attempt, to have a rational process for what we know are scarce funds. And, in fact, I think Bob creating it the way he has has set aside a recognition that these are activities we want to do, but they're limited in scope."