Residents from eight towns who attend on Wednesday will vote on a $3.6 million AOS 91 budget already approved by AOS board.

Carrie Jones and Shaun Farrar

Jan 18, 2026

BAR HARBOR—This Wednesday, the public has a chance to vote on the AOS 91 budget, which impacts the budgets of all the area schools and therefore all the area taxpayers.

This year that total budget increases to more than $3.6 million or a 7.25% increase.

Last year just 26 voters approved the AOS’ $3.4 million budget.

The meeting where residents of Bar Harbor, Cranberry Isles, Frenchboro, Mount Desert, Southwest Harbor, Swan’s Island, Tremont, and Trenton can vote to approve (or not) this budget is Wednesday, January 21, at 6 p.m. It tends to last less than an hour and it is at Mount Desert Island High School, 1081 Eagle Lake Road in Bar Harbor. It is unspecified which room it will be in, but it is usually either in the theater or library. Look for signs when you enter.

The AOS 91 budget has already been voted on and approved by the AOS 91 School Board, which is comprised of all members from each of the nine local school boards or committees. The AOS is the administrative portion of the region’s school system.

The AOS 91 School Board has 36 members. The high school board is comprised of the 20 members of the local school boards of the four MDI towns. Both of these boards have separate budgets, which work a bit differently.

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ASSESSMENT INCREASES AND DECREASES TO TOWNS

Unlike the high school budget, every town in AOS 91 pays toward the AOS budget. Only the four MDI towns pay toward the high school’s budget.

In the lists below, the high school is listed with the towns because it pays into the AOS just as if it was a town. However, while the AOS assessment to the high school is embedded into the overall high school school budget, just like the school budgets of the eight towns, the majority of the high school budget is paid by the four MDI towns.

The remaining towns pay tuition to the high school for the students attending from their schools.

Each town’s portion of the AOS budget is based upon a formula that uses three factors in determining what each town pays. However, prior to that formula calculation, every town in the system pays .5% of the total AOS budget. The remaining budget is paid using the three-factor calculation system. Those three factors are:

• The school’s percentage of the total combined school system budget;
• The school’s percentage of students in the AOS;
• The school’s percentage of full-time staff in the AOS.

These three percentages are averaged to determine the school’s share by percentage.

By town, the FY26/27 assessment percentages to be paid by each town and the change in percentage from FY25/26 are below.

• MDI High School – 27.37% – ( .14%)
• Bar Harbor – 22.21% – ( -.66%)
• Mount Desert – 11.93% – ( .31%)
• Southwest Harbor – 10.86% – ( .39%)
• Tremont – 10.60% – ( .24%)
• Swan’s Island – 3.24% – ( .08%)
• Cranberry Isles – 1.67% – ( -.07%)
• Frenchboro – .60% – ( -.29%)
• Trenton – 11.52% – (-.14%)

By town, the total projected FY26/27 assessments, assessment increase (or decrease) from FY25/26, and the percentage of the assessment increase (or decrease) from FY25/26 to each town are below.

• MDI High School – $845,467 – $4,325 – .51%
• Bar Harbor – $668,073 – $(-)20,388 – (-)2.89%
• Mount Desert – $368,521 – $9,576 – 2.67%
• S.W. Harbor – $335,468 – $12,047 – 3.72%
• Tremont – $327,437 – $7,414 – 2.32%
• Swan’s Island – $100,085 – $2,471 – 2.53%
• Cranberry Isles – $51,587 – $(-)2,162 – (-)4.02%
• Frenchboro – $18,534 – $(-)8,958 – (-)32.58%
• Trenton – $355,856 – $(-)4,325 – (-)1.2%

By town, the additional taxpayer burden per $100,000 of property value for the proposed FY26/27 budget is not available for this budget as it is built into the total of each individual town’s school budget.

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WARRANT ARTICLES AND INCREASES

The overall proposed FY26/27 budget is $3,645,620 which is a 7.25% increase or $246,363 over the FY25/26 budget of $3,399,257.

The total proposed assessment to the towns for FY26/27 is $3,089,028 which is a 3.9% or $115,981 increase over the FY25/26 budget town assessment of $2,973,047.

By warrant article number the increases are as follows.

Article 1, “special education” has a proposed increase of 4.92% or $61,983. This brings the FY25/26 budget of $1,260,735 to a proposed $1,322,718 for FY26/27.

Article 2 is broken down into two different headings which are combined into one amount for the actual warrant. If you combine the two, it brings the FY25/26 budget of $947,670 to a proposed $999,370 for FY26/27.

• Article 2, “staff and support, office of curriculum” has a proposed increase of 4.91% or $24,783. This brings the FY25/26 budget of $504,742 to a proposed $529,525 for FY26/27. This is due to salary and benefit increases and testing materials.
• Article 2, “student and staff support, technology” has a proposed increase of 6.08% or $26,917. This brings the FY25/26 budget of $422,928 to a proposed $469,845 for FY26/27. This is due to salary and benefit increases and an increase in technology hardware with a decrease in conference costs.

Article 3, “system administration” has a proposed increase of 11.14% or $132,680. This brings the FY25/26 budget of $1,190,852 to a proposed $1,323,532 for FY26/27. The reasons for the increases are salary and benefit increases, insurance increases, new conference room chairs and accounting software upgrades.

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TAXPAYER INPUT FOR THE PROPOSED AOS 91 BUDGET

School budgets make up a large portion of the town budgets for all four towns on Mount Desert Island. Those individual school budgets are crafted by school administrators and then scrutinized until a final version is approved by the individual school’s school committee or board whose membership stands as taxpayer/resident/student representation.

These budgets are then further scrutinized by warrant committees and select boards/councils before being approved to be put on a town’s town meeting warrant.

As registered voters, residents have the annual opportunity to weigh in and to approve, or not approve, those school budgets at their town’s annual meeting.

The same holds true for the AOS budget. While not under the jurisdiction of any one town government, the AOS board is made up of the boards of all nine schools in the AOS that are residents’ representatives in AOS matters, including the budget.

However, the AOS board approving a budget does not ratify it. The AOS budget must still go through a public meeting process where the public (registered voters of any of the eight towns that make up the AOS) gets the opportunity to attend, ask questions, and vote on whether or not the budget gets final approval. This is the registered voters of each of the eight towns opportunity to have a say in the budget and how it affects their property tax burden.

The MDI High School annual public budget meeting will be April 1 at the MDI High School.

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