The most fateful decision made about Barre City’s fiscal future might not be made by voters at its Town Meeting Day election on May 13.
Rather, it’s the decisions made by state lawmakers, federal agencies and the Trump administration at large that have already affected Barre’s coffers as it slowly pulls itself up from two major flood events.
“Our recovery and the impacts (are) not felt across just one year. We need sort of an off-ramp, and we need multiyear assistance,” Barre City Manager Nick Storellicastro said. “I mean, that obviously didn’t translate to this year.”
Voters will soon decide whether to support the $14.8 million 2026 budget proposal, representing a property tax rate increase of 5.87%. Barre City voters moved its Town Meeting Day to May in 2024 to better fit the back end of the state Legislature’s calendar.
The budget Storellicastro helped to prepare this upcoming fiscal year had to work without the roughly $1 million in state flood aid that the city received in 2024. Barre City was one of the hardest-hit communities in Vermont during the 2023 flood event, and was hit again, less hard, the following year.
So far, the city has received only $50,000 in direct operational assistance for this upcoming fiscal year, which runs from July 1 to June 30, from the state.
“We’re never going to turn down money from the state. But obviously, the difference between $50,000 (and) a million is a big deal,” he said. “We probably could have used a number with six figures in it, it would have been something more meaningful.”
Barre City officials ultimately chose to make up its budget deficit by cutting its bulky waste removal service, leaving positions unfilled and raising certain city fees and taxes, among other measures. The city also benefited from a small boon: Longtime Barre resident Eugene Cozzi bequeathed a large trust to the city upon his death in 2024, $75,000 of which will be used this year to help support cemetery operations, Storellicastro said.
However, the fate of a bill that would provide flood-affected municipalities some fiscal relief is still up in the air. H.397, currently in the Senate Government Operations Committee, has a variety of measures geared toward helping communities keep as much of their revenue as possible.
Rep. Teddy Waszazak, D-Barre City, said that as the state’s financial situation has gotten worse due to Trump administration cuts across the country, he worked on H.397 to “put smaller pieces” of funding together for municipalities.
He said the bill would create a new state-led flood buyout program to replace or add onto the flood buyouts from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“We need to build up our state systems,” he said. “We can’t assume FEMA will be there,” as the Trump administration has cut back on key FEMA programs.
The bill would also create a new “municipal grand list stabilization fund,” which for five years would reimburse municipalities for lost property taxes on flood buyouts, since properties purchased by communities for flood mitigation or recovery represent a loss in potential property tax revenue.
Storellicastro told the Senate Committee on Government Operations on Tuesday that 60 Barre property owners have applied for buyouts. Of those, Barre has approved only 27.
“Barre City is four square miles,” he said. “Anytime we give up a parcel to a FEMA buyout, that is gone forever from property tax revenue, from development, from housing, from whatever you want to call it. So we only decided to move forward with very targeted buyouts of clusters along the river because those properties have mitigation value to the city as a whole.”
Another provision in the bill would allow communities to keep a larger percentage of their local options tax, 75% rather than 70%, Waszazak said. The remaining portion goes into a state fund that provides tax relief to municipalities for state-owned property.
Town officials beyond Barre support those changes, while acknowledging they have limitations. Tom Leitz, municipal manager for Waterbury, said the extra 5% in local options tax would mean an additional $60,000 in revenue for the town.
“I think we’ll be back asking the same questions of the Legislature in a year or two, but I’m still really happy to get an additional 5%,” he said. “That’s a big win for us.”
Liz Scharf, Middlessex Select Board chair, said the town was in the process of approving 12 buyouts that could translate to a loss of $60,000 in property tax revenue per year.
“It’s not something we can rely on in perpetuity,” because of the five-year time limit, she said. “But it obviously would be helpful to have that.”
Yet the town’s challenges go well beyond buyout funds. Middlesex is still waiting on more than $5.4 million in FEMA reimbursement for the emergency repairs it made for the 2023 flood. The money has been coming in “at a snail’s pace,” she said.
The delay has left Scharf with a daunting fiscal bind.
“Usually, a town like us would have $200,000 to $400,000 of reserve funds, just for things, right? Like, ‘Oh, yeah, this broke down and we didn’t have the money for it.’ We have zero reserve funds,” she said.
Meanwhile, “everything in our town is falling apart,” she said: the town hall, the town shed, a town-owned truck. Just recently, she got a picture from the town’s foreman of a road that appears to be sinking toward a gorge, the kind of damage that could cost thousands to repair.
The town has been borrowing funds to keep up, but Scharf is worried its credit will max out soon.
“I don’t know what to do in the next storm,” she said. “I don’t know how we’re going to pay for the next road repairs, because we just don’t even have the money to front it.”
