As the Boston Globe reported yesterday, House Speaker Sal DiMasi is predicting a cut of 5 percent to 10 percent in local aid, or funds from Beacon Hill to city and town governments, next year.
Such a cut would not affect all communities equally. It’s possible that the Legislature could tinker with funding formulas so that the cities most dependent on local aid do not suffer the brunt of the cuts (as Blue Mass Group’s NoPolitician suggests here), but there’s not getting around the fact that certain communities have a lot more to lose. The map below shows how much of each community’s revenue came from local aid (as opposed to property taxes and locally imposed fees), and the “danger zone” includes most of the state’s Gateway Cities, as well as a cluster of towns in the south central part of the state. Below the map are lists of the communities that are most — and least — dependent on local aid.
Cities and towns most dependent on state aid:
1. Lawrence: 68.5%
2. Lynn: 59.1%
3. Springfield: 58.5%
4. Clarksburg: 57.7%
5. Holyoke: 57.3%
6. Lowell: 54.7%
7. Fall River: 54.1%
8. Chelsea: 53.8%
9. North Adams: 52.9%
10. New Bedford: 49.2%
Boston ranks 81st (25.1%). After Clarksburg (which borders North Adams), the non-cities most dependent on local aid are Winchendon (49.1%), Leicester (47.8%), and Palmer (46.7%). Haverhill, which ranks 47th (46.1%), is the lowest Gateway City on the list.
Cities and towns least dependent on state aid:
1. Chilmark: 0.2%
2. Aquinnah: 0.3%
3. Alford: 1.4%
4. Manchester-by-the-Sea: 1.6%
5. Nantucket: 1.7%
6. Stockbridge: 2.1%
7. Dennis: 2.2%
8. Essex: 2.7%
9. West Stockbridge: 2.8%
10. Orleans: 2.8%
Resort towns tend to have the least at stake in battles over local aid. Among communities with more than 30,000 people, the most self-sufficient are Lexington (5.8% of its revenue from local aid), Newton (7.3%), and Falmouth (8.5%).