Ashland Has a Moderate Avg. Income Yet Town Hall Demands More Taxes
At the Town Meeting, the Financial Committee Chair said something along the lines of: “We live in an expensive area and have to pay the same bills, etc.”
Ask yourself: How do people keep up with the financial Joneses desired by our elected boards and staff?
Ashland is in a strange economic place. It has a lower Median Household Income compared to some of the towns around it (Hopkinton, Holliston). But its income comes in slightly above towns with lower Median Household incomes but a massive commercial base. Commercial heavy towns may be a bit less but they can make up for it with all the businesses. See Chart below:
Ashland doesn’t have that option. Struggling people here are being asked to step it up for the staff (many handsomely paid) and the Selectboard and vote to increase their property taxes that they probably can’t even afford now.
Ask yourself: How can someone even do that and why would we ask that of someone in our community?
This entire year or even the past couple of years our Town Hall could have been lobbying to get more money from the State. We could have all taken a bus to the state house. Instead, they have spent it trying to get water from a stone.
Ashland has many seniors who do lots of volunteer work. And the additional irony here is that the Council on Aging is supposedly getting a whopping $19,757 more for Financial Year ’27 — although the budget line (01541) in the town warrant doesn’t even show that. The percentage increase looks blank on the warrant. Was that a typo? There are town staff being paid more than that in annual income so they won’t leave.
Thank you,
– Julie Nardone, Ashland resident