Editor’s note: This is part three in the Marblehead Current’s series, “Overriding Considerations,” which explores various facets of the “fiscal cliff” on which the town is teetering. To read the previous installment, see:
- Part 1: Behind Marblehead’s $65 million payroll in 2025
- Part 2: Analysis: Town’s tax burden ranks low among peers
Communities across Massachusetts are increasingly turning to property tax overrides as rising costs outpace limits on local revenue growth.
Data from the Massachusetts Department of Revenue shows a sharp increase in both the number of communities placing override questions on ballots and the total dollar amounts requested.
In fiscal year 2026 alone, 54 municipalities placed 74 override questions on local ballots, seeking more than $158 million in additional tax revenue — the second largest total since the early 1990s.
A decade ago, the numbers were far smaller.
In FY 2017, 21 communities placed 26 override questions on ballots statewide. Those requests sought about $19 million in additional revenue.
“We can tell this is going to be a big, big year for override deliberations,” said John Ouellette, senior executive and director of communications at the Massachusetts Municipal Association.
Across the state, he said, communities are confronting similar choices.
“Communities are finding themselves in a position where it’s an override or layoffs and service cuts,” Ouellette said. “It’s not any more complicated than that. They just have nowhere to turn.”
Marblehead is set to add to that trend.
The Select Board last Wednesday tasked Town Administrator Thatcher Kezer with creating three potential Proposition 2 1/2 override options as officials attempt to close a projected $7.7 million shortfall in fiscal year 2027.
Those options could range from an override that would reverse proposed cuts to a larger plan that would expand or modernize town services.
A statewide pattern
Experts say the fiscal pressures driving override debates are not limited to any one region or type of community.
“Our members are seriously concerned about the fiscal sustainability of these operations that deliver essential services,” Ouellette said.
Cities and towns across Massachusetts are facing rising costs for staffing, benefits, infrastructure and facilities while operating under strict limits on revenue growth.
“We do hear the term ‘fiscal crisis’ — it’s not hyperbole,” Ouellette said. “No one’s really immune.”
At the March 11 Select Board meeting, member Erin Noonan pushed back on claims that officials were exaggerating the town’s budget pressures to sway voters.
“I think the idea that we are employing scare tactics or cherry picking a strategic thing, because we have an agenda … it couldn’t be farther from the truth,” she said. “These are not fabricated numbers. This deficit has been coming.”
Phineas Baxandall, director of research and policy analysis at the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, said many of the financial pressures facing towns come from forces largely outside local control, including rising health care costs, higher expectations for public services and education, challenges attracting and retaining a workforce and infrastructure requirements such as costs for recycling that didn’t exist decades ago.
Communities like Marblehead, he said, should expect that addressing long-term challenges will require continued public spending, even when the need is not immediately visible to residents.
“Marblehead, as it approaches the challenges of next decades, should expect that it’s going to require public expenditures to address these things, and it won’t always be immediately clear,” he said.
Baxandall pointed to everyday consequences, such as struggling to find a plumber, that can emerge when municipal capacity shrinks.
“These things have an impact, and they do matter,” he said.
Override history among peer communities
Looking at the longer history of override votes among the same 17 Massachusetts communities analyzed earlier in this series helps explain why towns that appear similar on paper can end up in very different places on tax-burden charts.
Records from the Massachusetts Department of Revenue show that most of those communities have periodically asked voters to approve general overrides since the early 1990s.
Several towns have done so repeatedly.
Voters in Sudbury, for example, have faced 11 general override attempts since 1990, approving five of them.
In Milton, residents have approved eight attempts, including two since 2010.
Similarly, voters in Medfield have approved seven overrides, while Lexington residents have approved six.
Each successful general override permanently increases a town’s property-tax levy limit under Proposition 2 1/2. Future annual tax increases — generally capped at 2.5% — are then calculated from that higher base.
Over time, that can significantly expand the amount of revenue a community is able to raise.
However, not every town in the comparison group has relied on overrides.
In Bedford and Andover — both of which ranked near the top of the earlier tax-burden comparisons — there have been no general override attempts recorded since 1990, according to state data.
Among the 17 communities analyzed, Marblehead stands out not for how often overrides have been proposed, but for how rarely they have passed.
Department of Revenue records show nine general override attempts since 1990, including two that voters approved in the early 2000s, but none have been approved since then.
How other communities have approached overrides
The experiences of other Massachusetts towns offer a glimpse of how communities have navigated those decisions.
In Lynnfield, the override debate unfolded in a way similar to the current discussion in Marblehead, with officials warning that sweeping service cuts could follow if voters rejected new funding.
School leaders projected that 56 school employees could lose their jobs, while the town library would face major staffing reductions and reduced hours. Officials also warned that the cuts could jeopardize the town’s library certification and state funding, while the senior center also faced potential funding losses.
Framed largely as a school-focused measure, voters ultimately approved a $4.65 million override in June 2025.
Similarly, in Milton, a nearly $9 million general override proposal to fund both town and school operations passed on its first attempt last April.
Many overrides pass on a second attempt
One of the clearest patterns in override politics is that voters often reject proposals the first time they appear on the ballot.
A review of state records show hundreds of Massachusetts communities have successfully passed overrides within a year after an initial defeat, suggesting that initial rejection does not necessarily end the debate.
In May 2024, Georgetown voters rejected by a 56-44% margin a $3 million override intended to stabilize the town’s budget.
The failure immediately triggered warnings of major cuts. School officials said up to 19 teachers and staff would face layoffs or non-renewal notices, while town leaders emphasized potential impacts on emergency response times.A year later, the vote flipped on a $6 million override. It passed with a 55-45% margin, 1,659 yes to 1,348 no, and far more voters participated in the election.
And in Melrose, voters rejected a $7.7 million override in June 2024, forcing city leaders to cut $6.1 million in employees and services to pass a balanced FY26 budget. Officials warned that without additional revenue, further reductions would affect services ranging from elder programs to road maintenance.
Officials later returned to voters with a tiered proposal offering several funding levels tied to different degrees of service restoration. When residents went back to the polls in November 2025, the outcome changed dramatically.
A $13.5 million general override — the largest option on the ballot, aimed at restoring city and school services and investing in infrastructure — passed, with support rising from roughly 4,300 votes in favor during the first attempt to nearly 6,000.
In Stoneham, however, voters also revisited an override after an earlier defeat but ultimately chose the smaller funding option in a tiered proposal during a special election last December.
Ouellette said such debates often evolve as residents begin to see the real-world impact of budget constraints.
“Sometimes, the first time that voters see an override question is kind of theoretical,” he said. “If that doesn’t pass, then it gets real. The equation is very simple — it’s either override or layoffs and service cuts. That causes people to think differently about how valuable those services are.”
Implications for Marblehead
The experiences of other communities show that the debates and the difficult tradeoffs they involve are not unique.
For voters, Baxandall said, the choices can be difficult.
“It’s hard when none of the choices seem like good ones,” he said. “Higher tax bills seem like a bad choice, but not being able to sustain a school system because you’re losing families and not being able to make the investments … isn’t the kind of town people necessarily want to live in, either.”
As town officials prepare potential override options, the experiences of other Massachusetts communities suggest the debate may involve not just the size of the tax increase, but the broader question of what services residents want their town to provide.
“Override decisions are really difficult because people approach them as pocketbook decisions,” Baxandall said. “But they’re also community decisions about what kind of town people want to live in.”
