Chariho Budget Passes Easily

By Cynthia Drummond for BRVCA
April 5th 2023

RICHMOND – On Tuesday, voters in Charlestown, Richmond and Hopkinton approved the Chariho budget by nearly 800 votes – 1,950 to 1,336. This year’s budget referendum was a far cry from last year’s vote, when voters rejected the proposed spending plan.

After all the cuts, the new budget is $57 million, a 1.74% increase over the current budget.

In this year’s referendum, in Charlestown, 670 people approved the budget and 182 voted against it. In Hopkinton, 610 voted to approve and 596 were opposed, a margin of just 14 votes. In Richmond, the vote was 670 in favor and 558 opposed.

Charlestown Town Council President Deborah Carney, a budget supporter, said she was encouraged by the higher voter turnout in the three towns, including Charlestown.

“It’s good to see so many people come out and vote,” she said. “On a personal note, I’m glad that the budget passed.”

Why was this year different?

To understand the significance of this year’s voting shift, it is helpful to look at previous years, when the budget was rejected, or barely passed.

Voters soundly rejected the proposed budget last year, not once but twice, with Charlestown the only town to approve it.  That defeat resulted in a level-funded budget for the current year.

In 2021, Hopkinton was the only town to reject the budget, but there was sufficient support from the other towns for it to pass.

A list of budget votes doing back to 2018 is on the Friends of Chariho Facebook page.

Divided communities

In the weeks leading up to the most recent referendum, there was considerable rancor on both sides

On March 29, School Committee member Clay Johnson, of Richmond, sent a letter to unaffiliated and Republican voters urging them to vote against the budget.

Johnson’s letter concludes with,

 “Vote NO on Tuesday April 4th on the school budget. Send a STRONG message that we, the taxpayers, will NOT STAND for any more budget games, un-American teaching or inefficient spending. YOUR vote matters!”

The letter was paid for by Johnson’s Chariho Forgotten Taxpayers political action committee. The cost of printing and mailing it is unknown, since the PAC is not required to record the expenditure on the Rhode Island Board of Elections website.

Johnson owns a Goddard School franchise in South Kingstown. The Goddard School is a nationwide franchise of 600 private, “early child education centers” in 37 states.

Despite his vocal opposition to the budget, he did not attend the March 14 School Committee meeting during which it was adopted by committee members.

Chariho supporters reacted to the vote with a combination of relief and caution.

Superintendent of Schools Gina Picard was encouraged by the increased voter turnout and said she hoped to continue to demonstrate the value of the district to the community.

“I think, for me, the goal will be to continue to ensure that our community sees our district as one of its greatest assets,” she said.

Picard did note, however, that the district’s healthcare fund balance, which was reduced by $877,725 to $6.2 million during the budget process, will have to be monitored.

“The one I’m probably most concerned about is the healthcare fund balance that was cut, because we did see additional monies in that fund, because people were not utilizing those services throughout COVID,” she said.

The fund balance could be depleted by healthcare claims that have not yet been submitted, Picard warned.

“It could be something that costs us more money than people expect and I’m hoping that doesn’t happen, but we’re going to have to keep a close eye, because we may have to move some money back into that,” she said.

School Committee Chair Catherine Giusti, of Hopkinton, said the budget referendum could be viewed, in a broader sense, as a referendum on public education.

“That’s really what this came down to is, a community understanding that education is important, and a cornerstone of our community,” she said.

Giusti said she believed that voters had realized how much was at stake in this referendum.

“This is the first year in many where we have had to say ‘if this budget doesn’t pass, there will be catastrophic changes made,’ and I think that always motivates a community,” she said.

Picard agreed that voters appeared to realize what the district stood to lose if the budget did not pass.

“We all saw that elections have consequences, that the votes have consequences, and when our parents saw how class sizes had risen last year and while it was just a few, it was enough to notice, and our world language program was cut out of elementary, [and] there is a reduction in the way we can do business around buses. I heard a lot of parents say last year ‘if I had only known. I didn’t realize,’” she said.

Friends of Chariho versus Forgotten Taxpayers

After the Chariho budget was rejected last year, the Friends of Chariho group was resuscitated to counter the efforts of budget opponents, including Johnson’s Chariho Forgotten Taxpayers PAC.

The mother of two children attending Chariho schools, Jessica Purcell is a member of the Friends of Chariho.

“Last time, we were taken off guard when it didn’t pass the first time, and also, when it didn’t pass the second time, and I think that gave us a rude awakening that if we want this budget, we have to work harder for it,” she said. “We have to counter some of the information.”

Purcell was also the next highest vote-getter for a vacant Richmond seat on the School Committee, and has fought the Town Council’s decision to instead appoint Johnson. Oral arguments in the case will be heard next week in Rhode Island Supreme Court. 

Purcell said she did not expect the budget battles to end with this vote.

“I don’t think the fight is over,” she said. “I think it’s going to be an ongoing discussion about what is public education for, how do we provide it, how do we show our appreciation and value of it? It’s not going to end.”