From the Town Administrator's FY 2027 Budget narrative, each department's story is worth sharing.
General Purpose
The Town purchases the following insurance for the Town of Franklin and the Franklin Public Schools: Automobile, General Liability, Law Enforcement Liability, Property, Public Officials Liability and School Board Liability.
The Liability Insurance includes premiums for our insurance coverage through the Massachusetts Interlocal Insurance Association (MIIA). Our initial data suggests that we will see increases ranging from 4 to 8% on each of the insurance lines.
In addition to premiums through MIIA, the Town also pays a separate carrier for a drone liability policy and a vacant building liability policy. Drones are used by the Police Department, and we anticipate insurance will cost approximately $6,000 in FY27. The vacant building policy is for the Davis Thayer Building. We expect this to cost approximately $42,000 in FY27. This coverage protects the Town from potential liabilities and damages if anything happens within the vacant buildings.
Vacant properties are generally considered riskier to insure compared to occupied ones since insurance providers view them as more susceptible to vandalism, break-ins, and other perils due to their unoccupied status. Davis Thayer School closed in July 2021, so FY26 will be our fifth year of insuring it as a vacant property. Insurance carriers often are not willing to maintain coverage for vacant buildings indefinitely since there is so much risk involved, so we may eventually struggle to get coverage for the building.
The Town has an active “Safety Committee”, which Operations Manager Julie McCann and Human Resources Director Karen Bratt co-chair. Representatives from each Town department serve on the committee. The Safety Committee strategizes best practices and policies to avoid workplace injuries and maintain a safe work environment. This, in turn, helps reduce costly insurance claims which could affect future premium costs.
The Safety Committee also participates in a great incentive program provided by our insurance company, MIIA. The “MIIA Rewards Program” incentivizes the Town to implement various training requirements, best practices and policies to maximize staff proficiency across a broad spectrum of safety related matters. Each rewards eligible task or training that staff completes reduces the Town’s insurance premium by a certain percentage the following year. For the past several years, we have maxed out our rewards and saved between $35,000 to 52,000 per year in insurance premiums. We expect to max out our savings again in Fiscal Year 2026, which will result in a discount of approximately $35,000 against our FY27 premium.
Consistently, Franklin is among the top MIIA rewards earners of participating municipalities and have won numerous awards for our employee training programs.
The PDF of this section -
For the full FY 2027 budget narrative - https://www.franklinma.gov/DocumentCenter/View/8912/FY27-Budget-Narrative-FINAL-1
The FY 2027 budget information can be found
