SPRINGFIELD — Save two budget busters, next year’s spending plan would call for a 2.5% increase over this year.
But school busing has increased 12.2% to $42.8 million. In addition, the city is continuing to aggressively pay off the large deficit in the unfunded employees’ pension system, so it increased the payment by 9.1% to $67.5 million for the upcoming year, Mayor Domenic J. Sarno said.
That means instead the proposed budget for fiscal year 2025 is $928.7 million, an increase of 5.8% over last year’s $877.9 million budget, he said.