Results: Vermonters vote local on Town Meeting Day 2026
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Four out of five school budgets approved by voters
The prospect of yet another double-digit hike in property tax bills didn’t stop most Vermont voters from approving their local school budget proposals Tuesday.
According to results compiled by the Vermont School Boards Association, 82% of the 112 votes held on or before Town Meeting Day succeeded. The 19 rejections are slightly higher than historic norms but far from the one-third of budgets that went down in 2024.
Full story: Vermont voters approve 82% of school budgets, despite property tax implications
The following budgets were defeated:
- Barre Unified Union SD
- Echo Valley Community SD
- Paine Mountain SD
- Georgia SD
- Alburgh
- Kingdom East Unified Union SD
- Milton Town SD
- Missisquoi Valley Union SD
- Coventry SD
- Newport City SD
- Blue Mountain Union SD
- Mountain View Union Elementary SD
- Wolcott SD
- Otter Valley Unified Union SD
- Slate Valley Unified Union SD
- Southwest Vermont Union Elementary SD
- Springfield SD
- Green Mountain USD
- Weathersfield SD
Twelve school districts will hold budget votes later this spring.
Voters in 5 towns authorize natural disaster funds
Voters in Chittenden, Plymouth, Worcester, Waitsfield and Waterbury voted on Town Meeting Day to set aside town money for responding to natural disasters.
Chittenden residents voted 231 to 35 to allow their Bridge and Culvert Reserve Fund to be used for road and bridge repairs after an emergency if state and federal disaster funds aren't available right away or don't cover the full costs.
More: Federal disaster relief is uncertain. So these towns want to help themselves
Roughly 85% of voters in Plymouth opted to create an entirely new fund for road repairs after disasters, and committed to putting $100,000 of local tax revenue into it annually.
Voters in Waterbury approved a new disaster fund, putting $14,000 in local option tax revenues into it this year.
Waitsfield unanimously approved an All Hazards Reserve Fund, putting $10,000 into it this first year.
Greensboro voted down a new disaster reserve fund. During spirited debate, voters said they thought the town had sufficient general fund reserves for this purpose, without establishing a new reserve fund.
Voters approve bond for new middle and high school in Woodstock
Voters in the Mountain Views Supervisory Union have approved a $112 million bond for a new middle and high school in Woodstock, according to the Mountain Times.
The proposal is a reworked version of a bond that voters rejected two years ago.
The vote this time was 1,648 in favor and 1,047 opposed.
Construction will only happen, according to the terms approved by voters Tuesday, if the district secures at least $28 million in outside funding to offset local costs, and if the Legislature changes how school construction debt is treated in tax formulas.
Marlboro, Readsboro vote to close schools
Residents in Marlboro and Readsboro voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to close their schools at the end of the school year.
Marlboro residents voted 311 to 65 in favor of closing Marlboro Elementary School. In Readsboro, residents voted to close the Readsboro Central School by a margin of 222 to 36, according to WCAX.
Both schools are small, with about 50 students in Marlboro’s pre-K-8 school and 37 enrolled in Readsboro's pre-K-6 school.
Those numbers were projected to drop even further over the next few years.
Tom Donahue elected mayor of Rutland
Tom Donahue will be Rutland’s next mayor. He won the most votes in an unusual write-in campaign on Tuesday that was set in motion when former Mayor Michael Doenges resigned midway through his two-year term.
According to unofficial results, Donahue got 1,323 votes followed by David Allaire, president of the city’s board of aldermen, who got 999.
Donahue, a member of Rutland City’s board of aldermen is currently CEO of BROC Community Action, a job he’s held for a decade. Before that, the 68-year-old was the longtime head of the Rutland Region Chamber of Commerce.
Full story: Tom Donahue wins Rutland's write-in mayoral race
Other mayoral elections across the state were uncontested. Thomas Renner was elected mayor in Winooski, Trudy Cioffi in St. Albans and Marc Gwinn in Montpelier.
Brattleboro to discontinue representative town meeting
Brattleboro voters appear to have abolished their peculiar form of Town Meeting Day. But it's unclear how they will replace it.
For 65 years, Brattleboro has delegated traditional Town Meeting powers to 150 representatives elected by their fellow residents.
But voters on Tuesday chose to eliminate their so-called "representative town meeting," according to the Brattleboro Reformer.
The ballot also included two alternate plans to replace the representative town meeting model — one to hold a traditional open in-person town meeting in the future, and one to move to Australian ballot votes.
Voters approved both plans.
More from Vermont Public: Brattleboro Town Meeting Day ballot offers solutions and confusion
The conflicting result means the Vermont Legislature will ultimately decide what the town's governance will be.
In the meantime, Brattleboro will hold an open town meeting on April 11.
School budgets pass in many large Vermont districts
All eyes this Town Meeting season were once again on school budgets.
Voters in many large districts, including Colchester, Winooski, Burlington, South Burlington, and Champlain Valley all approved their budgets this year.
In Burlington, more than two-thirds of voters approved the proposed budget for next school year. The Champlain Valley School District saw similar results, with 65% of voters casting votes in favor of the budget.
Bethel and Royalton voters also approved their school district budget, but not without some reported grumblings.
Meanwhile, voters in Georgia, Williamstown and the Slate Valley District rejected their proposed school budgets.
In Milton, the school budget vote failed by just 28 votes.
Waterbury voters approve flood mitigation project
Waterbury voters have approved a $4.3 million project to excavate a field next to the Winooski River.
Town leaders have called the project — which will entail removing soil in thousands of dump truck loads — “the only meaningful option” to mitigate future floods.
The Waterbury Roundabout reports the vote was 1,081 in favor and 360 opposed.
Though voters were asked to approve a bond for the full cost of the project, town officials hope grants will keep the town’s contribution to no more than $1.8 million.
More from Vermont Public: Waterbury voters will weigh flood plain project on Town Meeting Day
Local option taxes fail in Milton and Castleton, pass in Swanton and Fair Haven
At least 18 municipalities considered some version of a 1% local option tax on top of statewide sales, rooms, meals, or alcoholic beverage taxes.
These taxes are sometimes pitched as a way to alleviate pressure on property taxes by raising money another way.
Results on Tuesday were mixed, with some resounding rejections.
Castleton voters rejected three local option taxes — for sales, meals and alcoholic beverages, and rooms.
Mark Brown, a select board member in Castleton, told Vermont Public it "wasn't even close."
"It certainly says Vermonters are fed up with taxes and they don't have any appetite for new ones," he said.
Members of the select board had supported these proposals, but Brown said he thinks they "misread the temperature in town."
"We felt that overwhelmingly people felt that it was unfair that they were overburdened by property tax bills, and this was an attempt to shift some of those needed tax revenues to other users. But we obviously misinterpreted what people in town wanted."
Milton voters overwhelmingly rejected adding a local option tax on sales, meals, alcoholic beverages and rooms, with about 71% opposed, preliminary results show.
And Londonderry voters rejected an expansion of their existing local option tax to include sales, according to reporting from the Manchester Journal.
Swanton approved all forms of a local option tax. So did Fair Haven. The Rutland Herald reports this is the third time Fair Haven has tried putting a local option tax before its voters.
West Windsor voters didn't want the tax for sales, but endorsed it for meals, alcohol and rooms, the Valley News reported.
And Mendon approved the tax on sales, rooms and meals, and alcohol during its in-person meeting, according to the Rutland Herald.
Castleton voters reject sale of town land for proposed senior housing
Castleton voters rejected a plan to sell town land to a developer who wants to build a senior housing complex there.
Town Manager Michael Jones told Vermont Public on Tuesday evening that preliminary results indicate voters overwhelmingly opposed the plan.
Some had argued the four-story, 99-unit design won’t fit the neighborhood.
More: Castleton voters will weigh in on proposed senior housing facility after years of opposition
Developer Zak Hale with Hale Resources said in an interview he's "disappointed" by the news. He said it's too early to know how this will affect the future of the housing project.
"But I mean we can't buy the land so, I mean that was the location we had identified was the best place for this, so I'm not really sure what comes next," he said on Tuesday evening.
Hale said he thinks the vote highlights broader challenges developers — both private and not-for-profit — face trying to build much-needed housing in Vermont.
"To find out that we're not going to build it because, I don't know, it feels like there was a group of people that didn't want this built in their backyard and they got enough of the wrong message out for it not to go through, and yeah, it's just like another Vermont housing project story," he said.
Williston residents approve library bond in close vote
Voters in the town of Williston approved a $13.9 million bond to pay for a library expansion.
It was a close vote, according to Town Meeting TV, with 50.9% of people in favor and 49% opposed.
The bond is meant to help update the Dorothy Alling Memorial Library and Village Green.
Planners say the town’s population has outgrown the library since its last addition in 1998. They estimate the bond would cost an extra $10 a month for the average taxpayer.
Library construction is expected to finish in late 2028.
Coventry approves reserve fund to offset property taxes after landfill's closure
Coventry residents voted in favor of creating a "Long-Term Tax Stabilization Fund" with revenues from the state's only landfill, according to the Newport Daily Express.
The town receives a tipping fee for hosting the landfill, and that revenue eliminates municipal property taxes for residents — a perk that could end once the landfill reaches capacity.
The new fund would go towards reducing residents' municipal property taxes after the landfill closes.
More: Coventry voters contemplate life after the landfill on Town Meeting Day
The town also voted to increase the number of select board members from three to five, and approved $2.5 million for a town garage, according to the Newport Daily Express.
Royalton approves 5-year ban on data centers
Royalton voters approved a five-year moratorium on the construction of artificial intelligence and crypto data centers in town.
The Valley News reports the vote was done by show of hands Tuesday. About 154 people attended the meeting.
There aren’t currently any proposals to bring a large-scale data center to the state, Kerrick Johnson, commissioner for the Department of Public Service, told Vermont Public. But state lawmakers are considering two bills — one would create criteria for data center construction, and another would stop them from being built in the next four years.
In Washington, D.C., Sen. Bernie Sanders has called for a national moratorium on the construction of new data centers.
More: Concern over big data centers is growing. Is Vermont likely to get one?
Dorset residents want public votes on long-debated housing project
Voters in Dorset approved two Town Meeting Day questions that require the select board to hold public votes before they move ahead with a controversial housing project on town-owned land.
Dorset has been investigating the feasibility of using a 308-acre parcel of land for housing, with potentially more than 100 homes.
The idea has been debated for more than two years, but voters at town meeting said they want to hold a public vote to approve the deal, and in a second question, which was also approved, Dorset residents said they want any future vote to be held by Australian ballot.
“This will allow more residents to participate,” Dorset Town Manager Rob Gaiotti wrote in an email after the town meeting, which was held Monday night. “Our plan is to present concepts during the summer in preparation for a potential vote in November.”
The town has been working with a consulting firm and has gotten a housing needs assessment, as well as a second study looking at the capacity for housing on the parcel, which is along Route 30 in the south end of town.
The town had moved ahead with a developer, but slowed down the process when there was some pushback to the plans.
“We are working through a public engagement process,” Gaiotti wrote. “We will know more as the process advances.”
Greensboro voters scrap emergency reserve fund
Voters in Greensboro decided not to create a new emergency reserve fund at town meeting. The select board had proposed creating the special fund to save for natural disasters and make money more readily available when they strike.
The board had also proposed adding $50,000 to the fund that was left over from FEMA grants related to flood damage from 2023.
Voters decided the fund wasn't necessary, saying their general fund reserves struck them as sufficient and that recent legislation makes it easy enough for select boards to draw from town coffers during emergencies, which used to require voter approval in Vermont.
Speaking at Tuesday's meeting, select board member Judy Carpenter told voters, "Given the current federal situation with FEMA, we can't rely on them coming through for us again. So you know, that's another point of maybe we got to take care of ourselves while we have some money to do it. And how we do that is up to you guys."
Attendees overwhelmingly voted against setting up the fund.
Greensboro was one of several towns across the state weighing similar resolutions.
Putney voters support election data privacy and universal health care
Putney voters on Town Meeting Day backed resolutions supporting private election data and public health care.
Former Windham County senator and Putney resident Jeanette White introduced a nonbinding question that supports Vermont Secretary of State Sarah Copeland Hanzas’ refusal to hand over Vermont’s voter checklist to the Trump administration.
“Among the many horrors that we’re seeing taking place in our country right now by our government, this is one that falls directly in the purview of the town meeting, I believe,” White said from the floor of town meeting.
While there were some “no” votes, Putney overwhelmingly approved White’s resolution that recognized both Gov. Phil Scott and Copeland Hanzas for standing up to the Trump administration and “protecting the privacy of residents.”
In a second Town Meeting Day question, Putney also voted in support of encouraging the Vermont Legislature to take up a bill that would establish publicly financed universal health care.
“Higher insurance premiums are passed on to employers, like our town,” said Jane Katz Field who introduced the question. “It is passed on in education costs. It is passed on in property taxes. This is such a town issue.”
Katz Filed said her resolution was in response to a legislative bill, H.433, which was introduced last year but never debated.
Katz Field said the bill suggests Vermont move slowly, over 10 years, to come up with a publicly financed health care system, starting with primary health care, mental health, and substance abuse treatment.
“It gives us a chance to envision, once again, seeing medical care as a public good, like public schools, like roads, like fire departments,” she said. “If we don’t deal with it, it just seems to be kicked down the road. The system is so broken. It’s not working the way it is.”
A Vermonter reflects on a lifetime of town meetings
Tracy St. Louis came to vote Tuesday in Greensboro with his dog Susie.
A longtime Wheelock resident, this was his first time attending Greensboro's town meeting since he was a kid.
He recently sold his family farm, which straddled the town line between Greensboro and Wheelock.
"I've always gone to town meeting," he said. "It's just, it's, you know, one of the last things where you get to actually go get involved with actual workings of where you live."
St. Louis said in his time attending, much stays the same at town meeting from town to town and year to year. For one, he says, people take the longest to debate the smallest budget items and the least time to debate the biggest ones.
But this year he noticed one big change from when he was growing up that did trouble him.
"Just seems to be a lot of gray hair in the room," he said. "What I find is a lot of younger people still have to go to work. They don't shut things down for the town meeting. Like when I was a kid things seemed to be shut down, we didn't have school."
St. Louis, who is a grandfather, thinks that's a shame, and towns should help parents get the chance to vote on school budgets. He thinks closing schools for the day and providing childcare would help.
Williamstown voters debate forensic audit, million-dollar bond
Concern about town spending took top billing at Williamstown's town meeting today, with hours of spirited debate on appropriations for town departments and the school district. But two articles generated far-and-away the most discussion on the floor.
The first asked voters whether they wanted to see a forensic audit of the town’s finances, after the town’s former manager was arrested and accused of embezzling more than $180,000 from the fire department in Tunbridge. She resigned from that role after the arrest late last year.
Williamstown sent a letter to voters ahead of the town meeting warning that a full forensic audit would cost $250,000, and said the town hasn’t found any evidence of fraud in the annual audits it already does. Still, Danielle Moffatt said she thought an audit would communicate the message that “Williamstown is not a town to come and screw around with,” even if no funds were stolen.
The second big-ticket ballot item was a $1 million bond to rehabilitate several dirt roads in town. The bond and the forensic audit both would increase Williamstown residents’ tax rates.
That concerned resident Stephen Clark, who said his taxes keep going up. He voted “no” to increases in spending down the ballot.
“I’m retired and everything. I only have so much money,” he said. “And when you decide, well, either I'm going to pay my taxes or I’m going to buy food, it’s not very pleasant.”
Both the bond and embezzlement articles were voted on via Australian ballot, and will be decided after polls are closed tonight.
Roxbury voters keep warm with chili — and heated debate
Inside Roxbury Town Hall, two steaming cauldrons of “RBJ’s Famous Chili Con Carne” served as sensory reminders of the reward that would follow a few hours of civil discussion about town matters.
This year, the chili also provided a needed source of warmth.
“We don’t have any heat,” meeting moderator Jacqueline Frazier told the several dozen neighbors who attended the annual town meeting. “It’s a true Roxburian day.”
Roxbury’s town hall is in the former Roxbury Village School, which closed in 2024. The town finally took ownership of the vacant building from Montpelier Roxbury Public Schools last month. Town leaders arrived Tuesday to find a malfunctioning air handler and broken internet system.
The debating and voting carried on. Frazier, wearing her puffy winter coat, opened the meeting by reciting the late singer-songwriter Jon Gailmor’s ode to Town Meeting Day:
“Down from the mountains, up from the dales, in from the woodlands, chockful of tales. Check out the neighbors, find out the news. We’ve all got the floor today — today, our time to choose.”
Roughly 75 of the town’s nearly 700 residents approved the town budget after adding $25,000 to support its two-person road crew, which some felt had been stretched thin this winter.
Discussion then moved to a proposal to impose a 1% local option tax on short-term rentals, to be paid by guests. The select board put forth the idea as a way to boost town revenue without adding to sharply increasing property tax bills. But select board Chair Jeremy Reed acknowledged that the tax would yield only $1,500 to $2,000 per year.
Many of Roxbury’s short-term rental operators spoke against the proposal, saying it would make their side hustles harder.
Longtime Roxburian Jerry D’Amico said the tax unfairly singled out one kind of business.
“You’re picking on five or six individuals,” he said. “Everybody thinks, ‘Oh, boy, they’re making money.’ Well, big deal. How much? You want to know?
“We had a big Airbnb last year,” D’Amico continued. “We took in $3,000. So if we declared that full $3,000, we’d pay $30. That’s a droplet of snow.”
D’Amico was wearing a hockey beanie over his long white hair and a fur vest that he said was fashioned from a fisher cat. His position on the rooms tax carried the day: It failed resoundingly by a voice vote.
Frazier paused the meeting around noon for lunch. A line bent like a rainbow toward the cauldrons of RBJ’s famous chili.
What was in it? You want to know?
A placard listed the ingredients: Local pork, maple syrup, poblano peppers and bear’s head tooth mushrooms that were harvested wild in town.
The chili con carne, the placard promised, is “perfect for voting, cold days and heated discussions with neighbors.”
Local option taxes divide Castleton voters
Local option taxes are on the ballot in about 20 communities across Vermont.
Castleton has three separate articles asking voters to approve a 1% tax. One for sales, one for meals and alcoholic beverages, and another for rooms.
Castleton Select Board members say it would help take the pressure off property taxes.
Nancy Barker said that's why she voted "yes" for all of them.
“It’s only 1%, and I think that’s helpful adding to the funds to pay for things,” Barker said
But Charles Brown was urging fellow residents to vote "no." He held a sign outside the polling place Tuesday and said Vermont is already one of the highest taxed states in the U.S.
“If we're going to succeed as a state and as a country, we gotta quit raising taxes," he said.
Town officials say debate over the local option tax as well as a controversial land deal for a senior housing development was pushing voter turnout.
Rutland voters bemoan a mayor's race with no names on the ballot
Rutland voters are electing a new mayor today — but because of timing of the outgoing mayor's announcement, no candidates are listed on the ballot.
Instead, eight people have publicly stated that they'd like voters to write their names in.
Voters at the polls expressed confusion over the unusual write-in election.
“It was difficult because if you weren't up on who was running, you wouldn't know who to write in, and I'm, I hopefully I spelled the person's name right that I put in," said Scott McVeigh of Rutland. "I would have liked to have seen a list of the people running.”
St. Albans, Montpelier and Winooski are also electing new mayors today, though those elections are uncontested.
Bristol voters adopt ‘anti-apartheid’ pledge
The most talked about article at town meeting in Bristol wasn't even on the warning.
Despite receiving a petition with over 200 signatures, the select board declined to put an “anti-apartheid” pledge denouncing Israel before voters this year.
But the pledge was revived in an amendment from the floor Monday evening. And while some argued town meetings should stick to local matters, its sponsor, Nick Dooley, countered that Vermonters have a long tradition of putting international affairs on the local ballot.
“We don’t have a way to have a national conversation anymore. We very much still have a way to sit here right now and talk about things as a community to express our shared values,” he said.
Some criticized the pledge as unfair. Anya Schwartz said that while she wanted “the soul-shattering violence in Gaza to end,” she felt like the pledge condemned the whole of the Jewish state.
“In its lack of distinction between the internationally recognized legal borders of the state of Israel and the occupied territories, is it meant to imply that Israel in its entirety is simply a project of settler colonialism?” she asked.
After over an hour of sometimes tense discussion — and a small amendment — the pledge was narrowly adopted by those still assembled around 11 p.m.
By then, most had already trickled out of the once-packed meeting. The vote was 35 in favor, and 30 against.
Some communities broach national and international issues
Town meeting isn't just for local decisions.
In some towns, citizens have petitioned to add items to the Town Meeting Day agenda that oppose actions of President Donald Trump's administration. These votes are non-binding and fall within a long tradition of Vermonters weighing in on national issues on Town Meeting Day.
Montgomery voters today will consider whether to ask Vermont's congressional delegation to impeach the president. (At an in-person meeting Saturday, Westminster approved a similar item calling for the removal of Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance, according to the Brattleboro Reformer.)
East Montpelier will consider a wide-ranging statement that opposes funding for the president's immigration enforcement efforts. Putney has an item supporting Vermont's refusal to turn over voter data to the federal government. Huntington voters will see language affirming a commitment to the U.S. Constitution.
And in Newfane, residents have drafted a resolution opposing the war in Iran, according to reporting by NPR.
"When you have people sleepwalking into an authoritarian regime, it's up to us to sound the alarm," said Dan Dewalt, an activist in Newfane quoted by NPR. Others in town argued town meeting wasn't the right venue for these kinds of debates.
More from NPR: In Vermont, small town meetings grapple with debate on big issues
Montpelier, Underhill, and Richmond are considering statements that support Palestinian people and denounce Israel's "apartheid regime, settler colonialism, and military occupation." Montpelier voters rejected a similar statement last year.
Williston pitches $13.9M library expansion
The town of Williston is asking voters to pay for a library expansion this Town Meeting Day.
The $13.9 million bond would help update the Dorothy Alling Memorial Library and Village Green.
Planners say the town’s population has outgrown the library since its last addition in 1998. They estimate the bond would cost an extra $10 a month for the average taxpayer.
If approved, library construction is expected to finish in late 2028.
Emerald ash borers show up in town meeting materials
A handful of Vermont communities will vote this Town Meeting Day to clean up after an invasive species — the emerald ash borer.
The beetles chew on ash trees and ultimately kill them. The town of Grand Isle is asking residents for $25,000 to remove dead ash trees.
Ron Bushway is the town moderator, select board member and road commissioner. He told Vermont Edition on Monday that the dead trees can't be ignored.
"Oh no, they're too dangerous," Bushway said. "If you let them go over time, the tree rots on the inside. It becomes just like a Styrofoam cup. There's no structure to it. They might just fall over any in any direction."
Londonderry and South Hero will vote on allocating $3,000 apiece to an infestation reserve fund. Norwich is asking residents for $60,000 to remove ash trees along public roads.
MAP: Emerald ash borer is now killing trees in at least 68 Vermont towns
Proposed school budgets would raise property taxes about 10% statewide
The school budgets that Vermonters will vote on today aren’t rising as steeply as elected officials once feared.
Gov. Phil Scott's administration was previously predicting a nearly 6% increase in education spending, based on a survey of school districts last fall.
But lawmakers got updated numbers last week that show proposed budget increases coming in at 4.2%.
That figure would still result in an approximately 10% increase in average statewide property tax bills.
But lawmakers and the governor are contemplating using more than $100 million in one-time money to cut that increase by more than half.
School budget votes can be a bellwether of voter sentiment midway through the legislative session, and angst over property taxes has fueled lawmakers' current education reform effort. Last week, Scott told reporters he'd personally vote no on his school budget in Berlin.
Here's your 2026 bingo card
It's a Vermont Public tradition: Save this bingo card to your phone, or print it out, and bring it with you to your town meeting.
