New Fairfield schools propose $53.6M budget plan for 2026-27

NEW FAIRFIELD — The school district’s $53.6 million financial plan for the upcoming fiscal year would raise spending by about $2.3 million — or 4.4% — over the current year’s $51.3 million budget. 

Superintendent Kenneth Craw shared the New Fairfield schools spending request for the upcoming year with the Board of Education last month. The drivers that are raising costs in the request include employee salaries, special education and student transportation, he said.  

But the superintendent also proposed new investments in the school district. 

Craw outlined a series of capital investments, which would total $615,000. One of the proposals calls for partitioning the middle school’s cafeteria into three music classrooms at a cost of $150,000. Another proposal seeks $75,000 for a feasibility study to assess replacing the middle school roof, its air handling system and related mechanical equipment. 

Repartitioning the cafeteria with sound buffering and other partitions would allow the district to move orchestra teachers out of small basement classrooms “where they don’t have a space to really put instruments,” Craw said, 

Educators were able to move out of hallways and into a classroom a year earlier. “But now we’re going to get them into a space that makes sense,” he said.  

Also in the middle school, Craw proposed enhancing the district’s world language program by adding a full-time Spanish teacher to restore daily language instruction for seventh and eighth graders. 

The superintendent described world language as “a core subject — just like English, math, social studies and science. Like math, you need to have it on a daily basis in order to have that practice.”

It has been 15 years since New Fairfield had daily world language instruction in the seventh and eighth grades, he said. 

Two years ago, the school district introduced full-year French and Spanish to sixth grade students. 

The investment would be cost-neutral, due to a restructuring of enrichment sources and the elimination of two paraprofessional educator positions, he said. 

The cost to maintain a baseline budget, continuing existing programs and services as they are currently run, would increase the budget by $1.6 million, or 3.15%, Craw said. Factoring in unanticipated costs, namely special education-related expenses, would raise the increase to 4.4%, he said. Those costs — including out-of-district tuition, a proposed increase in the contingency fund and paraprofessional salary increases — would add up to $660,110. 

Craw proposed raising the special education contingency fund by $42,000 to $150,000 to cover unanticipated referrals to out-of-district services and transportation costs. 

On the capital budget side, the middle school’s leaking roof needs to be replaced, which is why Craw said he proposed a feasibility study. 

“We have to plan for that roof to be replaced in the summer of FY27, because now some of the leaks have caused damage within the building,” he said. A “phased-in” approach for that replacement would make sense, Craw said. 

In addition to the roof, the middle school’s heating ventilation and cooling system need to be replaced and other items, such as doors, windows and fire suppression systems, will need to be looked at as well, Craw said. 

“It’s something we have to start now and think forward,” he said. 

The budget largely continues investments pursued in the current budget. Craw, when he presented that proposal, emphasized the need to serve the district’s growing numbers of multilingual learners and special education students and to support New Fairfield’s growing orchestra and theater programs. 

Last month, his message was similar. He urged board members to not just think about the financial figures in the budget request. 

“It all comes back to … the students we’re trying to support, and we have to think about the decisions we make in those lenses as well, not just the fiscal ones,” he said. 

The Board of Education will take up the proposal when it meets Feb. 5, before forwarding the request to town leaders.