Lee — With about three percent of its registered voters attending, or 152 out of a total of 4,835 registered voters, all 17 articles in Lee’s Town Warrant passed during the municipality’s May 8 Town Meeting, including a $23.6 million budget for fiscal year 2026 that, with a $700,000 transfer from available funds, tallies a $24.3 million appropriation. That budget represents a year-over-year increase of just under six percent.
The Lee Town Warrant can be found here.
Town Administrator Christopher Brittain stated in his warrant summary that the $700,000 transfer lowered the tax rate and, together with projected new growth and revenue, reflects an estimated tax impact of 4.5 percent after cuts were made to school, public works, police, and fire department staff as well as some capital items.
Brittain’s Lee Town Meeting Warrant Summary can be found here.
Residents attending the Town Meeting questioned big ticket items representing significant year-over-year budget increases, with insurance costs ticking up a massive 16.42 percent increase, year over year.
“All of the towns have faced a really substantial increase in insurance costs,” responded Town Counsel Jeremiah Pollard, who represents nine municipalities in the region. “Some of the line items went up, I’d say, at an almost unmanageable rate, so, at 14 percent, [that] makes budgets, school budgets, our budget just jump tremendously.”
Brittain added that new collective bargaining agreements between towns and service unions contributed to the increase. “It was a perfect storm for budgets this year,” he said.
At $11.8 million, the budget’s largest line item by far was the local school district expenditure, a charge that troubled some residents over its six percent increase year over year, excluding healthcare fees, considering the district’s small size.
For longtime Lee resident Peg Biron, the line item was noted, and she was interested to find the source for the increased charges. “I’m not opposed to it, but it has gone up quite a bit this year,” she told The Berkshire Edge before the session began.
The item was pulled for discussion before passing unanimously.
“I know that there was an effort by the town to reduce what was asked for originally, and that was done,” said resident Cornelia Kalischer, referring to two cuts made to the elementary school staff. “However, we have a very small population attending the school, and it’s a very large amount of money to be spent on very few children, and our tax rate is up.”
The Lee Public School District encompasses 632 students, said Superintendent Michael Richard.
Kalischer praised the district but suggested joining other school districts to reduce taxes. “A huge amount for a very small population,” she said.
Two additional appropriation items were pulled for discussion but later passed: $29,369 for animal control and $2,900 for war memorial flags, with residents asking for the sources of the expenditures. Brittain explained that the towns of Lee and Lenox share an animal control officer, with Lee subsidizing the full fee since the officer is a Lee employee but with reimbursement from Lenox. He said the flag charge for the current fiscal year represents an annual expenditure for the War Memorial/cemetery flags. Brittain differentiated that charge from the last year’s two fees incurred for both the annual War Memorial flag fee and an additional capital item spent to replace the Main Street flags, with the latter fee not incurred for fiscal year 2026.
Voters also approved expenditures for capital projects to replace the school roof, repave, and add tennis courts ($335,000); refurbish the Department of Public Works (DPW) fleet and replace a three-decade-old tow ($75,000); buy body cameras for police detail ($47,600); and upgrade technology at Town Hall ($37,500). A one-time capital expense of $5,000 for Lee’s portion of the total charges was accrued to relocate Tri-Town Health records to Stockbridge.
Other payments allocated in the budget include $150,390 to go toward the town’s paving bond, $102,202 for Department of Public Works lights and truck needs, and $86,363 for Lee Chamber of Commerce advertising. The Laurel Lake Preservation Association will receive $14,500, and Greenagers is set for $5,000 to maintain the Ferncliff Reservation.
The budget incorporates fire and emergency services bond payments: $128,685 for an older bond covering a new fire truck and ambulance in addition to $549,724, the first bond payment in conjunction with the fire and emergency services bond covering Lee’s new $36.7 million public-safety facility previously approved by voters.
The largest program to be funded by the Community Preservation Committee is a $100,000 purchase of 4.2 acres at 1235 Pleasant Street, with those funds matched by Massachusetts Department of Fish and Wildlife to construct a parking area and canoe/kayak access to the Housatonic River. The CPC allocations will also fund the renovation of outdoor basketball courts ($51,250), repair of local cemeteries (two appropriations of $24,000 and $21,000 for Fairmont and South Lee cemeteries), build out of a community garden ($14,000), and expansion of Longcope Park trails off Stockbridge Road ($15,000). An additional $15,000 for a new design of the Central Fire Station will provide a town use for the structure as the new public safety building project progresses.
Lee’s Town Meeting saw the two-thirds vote required to approve three new zoning bylaws relevant to accessory dwelling units (ADUs) and short-term rentals (STRs). An ADU is a rentable unit that may be attached to a primary home or on the same lot as that residence but with its own entrance, kitchen, and bathroom. An STR is a rentable unit for 30 days or less, similar to the popular Airbnb units.
The items follow legislation that went into effect February 2 mandating towns could not unreasonably restrict ADUs to owner residents, must allow the units as a matter of right, with the measure attempting to gain desperately needed affordable-housing choices statewide.
Specifically, the new local bylaw requires the size, or gross floor area, of an ADU to be not be more than half of the gross floor area of the main residence, or 900 square feet, whichever is smaller; allows only one ADU per lot, with an additional ADU by special permit; and mandates that no minimum lot size is required to house an ADU. However, an ADU cannot be rented as an STR.
With the passage of the last three articles, each STR owner in Lee is now required to register their unit annually with the town’s Land Use Department as well as employ a property manager who lives 30 miles or less from the unit if the owner is not on site.
Planning Board member Peter Bluhm announced that new software is in the works that will make tracking the new required registrations easier.
