The Barre City Elementary and Middle School seen in Aug. 2023. File photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger Updated at 5:39 p.m. The Barre Unified Union School District lost its budget revote Tuesday, making it the fifth school district in the state to fail to pass its budget a second time.  Acc ording to results from the Barre city clerk and the Barre town website, the budget vote failed 54% to 46%, with Barre city voting in favor of the budget while Barre town voted against it. That leaves the possibility of the district beginning the fiscal year, or even the school year, without a budget in place, which ultimately could lead to cuts throughout the district.  The school board had proposed a 2.73% budget increase for this vote, compared with the 3.36% increase it had proposed in March, Garrett Grant, chair of the school board, told VTDigger this month.  Grant said that while he was disappointed by the outcome, it was a possibility he’d prepared for, since the district has a history of failed budget votes.  In 2024, the school district was forced to start the year without a budget after the vote failed three times. The year before, the school district’s budget failed its first vote but passed on its revote.  “That was an interesting year because the general consensus was that it failed because it was too low,” Grant said.  In 2025, when the budget passed on its first try, he said he felt “blindsided” by the victory.  This year’s two failures were an opportunity to reflect and listen closely, rather than assume an “oversimplified” narrative on why people vote yes or no on the school budget, Grant said.  “Of course, it’s about property taxes and uncertainty with reassessment,” he said. “But then there are people who maybe feel disconnected from the school system because they don’t have children in it. There are people who feel burned by the school system as a parent or former staff.” As Barre’s newly reelected mayor, Thom Lauzon said the school district was outside his jurisdiction. But looking from that vantage point, he’s noticed “loud and opinionated” voices on social media on both sides of the issue.  “It started to become more about personalities and procedures, and much less about the budget and the numbers that were going into it,” he said.  Grant said the immediate next step was a discussion among the board at their scheduled June 1 meeting to talk about when and whether the district might vote again — and what happens if it keeps failing.  “I can’t speak for what the full board wants, but all I can say is it’s not likely we’ll start the fiscal year with a budget,” he said. “It could be a possibility, like in 2024, that we don’t start the school year with a budget.” That year, the district narrowly avoided having to borrow money from the state when its fourth vote passed in September, Grant said. Under Vermont policy, a district can borrow money from the state up to 87% of the previous year’s budget, which would have meant significant cuts.  But for now, the board needs to digest “why people voted no, what to do about the budget and ultimately when to have it — when’s a good time, when will people turn out to vote?” he said.  Barre school district now joins four others across Vermont that each have put their school budget up for a second vote, only to fail a second time. The other districts were Central Vermont Supervisory Union, Kingdom East School District, Orleans Southwest Supervisory Union and Orleans Southwest Supervisory Union, according to data provided by Sue Ceglowski, executive director of the Vermont School Boards Association.  Candidate results At the city level, Lauzon defeated challenger Bern Rose, 647 votes to 552, making it his eighth win as mayor. He said it was a closer race than he’s experienced before, making him speculate that perhaps voters aren’t seeing the work he said he’s been putting into tackling Barre’s challenges.  They don’t necessarily see the planning that’s gone into, for example, fixing the potholes by increasing the paving budget by 80%, he said. “It’s like, ‘OK, that’s great. It’s great talk. But what about all these potholes?’” Rose, Lauzon’s challenger, said via email that she was “deeply moved” by the gratitude of her supporters, but “deeply troubled” by the poverty she’s seen in her community. “We have a lot of work to do, and it will take us working together,” she wrote.  Incumbent Ward 1 city councilor Sonya Spaulding defeated challenger John Hood, 302 votes to 256, in the council’s lone competitive race. She said via email that she was looking forward to working on Barre’s biggest challenges, like infrastructure, housing and flood mitigation. “I will continue to strive to ensure that our city government works for everyone, not just business or property owners, and I will make sure we spend our tax dollars responsibly,” she said. Read the story on VTDigger here: Barre’s proposed school district budget fails — again. ...read more read less