Shelter Island, Elwood Fall Short of 60% Approval to Pierce the Cap
By Hank Russell
May 20 was a big day for school districts across Long Island as almost all of them had their budgets approved. However, two districts — whose proposed budgets pierced the tax cap — did not pass.
Both the Shelter Island Union Free District and the Elwood Union Free District saw their budgets fall short of the 60% majority needed to approve, since it went over the 2% tax cap.
According to The Shelter Island Reporter, the district’s proposed $13,855,325 budget received 424 votes in favor and 329 against. However, since that comes out to 54.8%, it was less than the supermajority needed to pass. The budget’s passage fell 40 votes short, according to the Reporter.
Shelter Island’s budget was 5.77% higher than this year’s adopted budget, which is $13,099,796. The district emphasized that it has not sought to pierce the tax cap in 10 years.
“However, as costs beyond the District’s control have increased, there is an inability to stay within the cap and still offer the same programs and services to the District’s students,” the district stated. “Cutting to stay within the property tax cap will require major changes to the character of the Shelter Island School.”
Had the budget passed, the district would “not [see] piercing the cap for a good number of years.”
Long Island Life & Politics reached out to the school district, but did not hear back as of press time.
Elwood proposed a budget of $79,395,286 for the 2025-26 school year, which is 3.43% greater than the current budget of $76,760,609. Only 54.2% of those voted in favor — just short of the supermajority needed to ratify the budget.
According to the district, it needed to pierce the tax cap “[a]s a result of rising costs that outpace district revenue increases,” adding the other option would be to “reduce programs,” which “would have [a] significant impact on students and further compound funding challenges for the future.”
LILP reached out to the school district about the vote. Lorraine Dunkel, Elwood’s assistant superintendent for business, said another vote will take place on June 17. When asked if another budget will be proposed, she replied, “An alternate budget will be proposed, but the amount is unknown at this time.”
If the second vote fails, Dunkel said, “the district is required to adopt a contingency budget.”
According to the budget, “[t]o reach a contingency budget, the district would need to make further reductions from the proposed budget totaling $2,231,996.”