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Are Brookline Voters Going To Be Asked To Increase Their Taxes?

1925

Brookline voters have passed property tax increases twice over the past decade. Will they do it again this year?

The town’s Select Board will hold a hearing at 7:00 p.m. Tuesday on proposed ballot questions aimed at raising revenue to support town and school operations and help pay for a high school expansion project.

The proposed override of Proposition 2½ would permanently raise the town’s tax levy by $11.7 million over three years, starting in fiscal 2019. (An alternative option calls for a $9 million hike.)

The town’s last override was approved in 2015. But that was before Congress passed a federal tax package, taking effect this year, that limits a filer’s deduction of state and local taxes to $10,000. In Brookline, the median single-family tax bill in fiscal 2017 was $11,684.

The Select Board will decide next month whether to place the tax questions on the town’s May 8 ballot.

Last fall, Somerville residents voted to fund the highest-priced school building project in Massachusetts history. But what about the trees?

At a 6:00 p.m. meeting Monday in the high school library, residents can learn more about the tree removal being planned before construction begins this spring on the $257 million project. Targeted trees include those between the rear of the school and the train tracks.