Spending vs. Peers

How Branford’s spending has moved against its surrounding towns and its statewide peer group, on one uniform set of numbers.

  • AUDITED FY 2013-14 → FY 2022-23
  • PULLED 2026-08-10
Spending per resident $4,460RANK 107 / 169 6% above the statewide median of $4,217 Audited actual ÷ population, FY 2022-23. CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators (ej6f-y2wf).
Education spending per pupil $25,957RANK 126 / 169 15% above the statewide median of $22,590 Audited actual ÷ average daily membership, FY 2022-23. CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators (ej6f-y2wf). OPM education expenditures divided by average daily membership. This is not the state Department of Education's Net Current Expenditures Per Pupil, which is calculated on a narrower basis and will differ.
Grand list per resident $264,555RANK 133 / 169 39% above the statewide median of $189,668 Equalized net grand list ÷ population, FY 2022-23. CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators (ej6f-y2wf).
Before you read these charts.
  • Audited actuals — Audited actuals are what a town actually spent and received across all its governmental funds, as reported after the year closed. They are not the budget the town adopted.
  • Peer groups — A peer group is a tool for a specific question, not a verdict. A group that is right for comparing school spending can be wrong for comparing snow plowing. Where two defensible groups disagree, this site shows both.
  • Academic growth (percentage of target achieved) — Growth measures how far a student moved in a year toward a target set from their own prior score; the achievement index measures where students ended up. Growth depends less on family circumstances than the level does — less, not not at all — so this site shows it first.
  • Medians, and why the town is left out of its own — A group is summarized by its median — the middle town, not the average. The subject town is excluded from its own group median, because a town cannot be part of the benchmark it is measured against.
  • Per-pupil spending — There is more than one per-pupil number, and they are not interchangeable. What this site derives from OPM spending and average daily membership is not the state Department of Education's Net Current Expenditures Per Pupil.

Full definitions, what each measure does not support, and the source behind it: How these numbers work.

About the figures on this page. Every chart here comes from one source: the CT Office of Policy and Management’s Municipal Fiscal Indicators.
  • Coverage. This page covers every fiscal year the state publishes town by town; the exact span appears here once the data loads.
  • Responsibility for the underlying figures changed partway through the period covered: the state compiled the earlier years itself, and in the later years municipalities self-report their own audited data.

01 Which towns is this one being measured against?

Who this town is being compared with

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02 Has this town’s spending grown faster than its neighbors’?

Total Spending Growth — Surrounding Towns

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Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators, ej6f-y2wf (total_expenditures), each town’s series divided by its own first-year value. The dashed median line is the median of the individual index lines shown behind it — the middle town’s cumulative growth in each year, not the growth of any one town across all years.

03 And against the towns the state calls its demographic peers?

Total Spending Growth — District Reference Group Peers

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Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators, ej6f-y2wf (total_expenditures), indexed per town. Group membership: CT State Department of Education District Reference Groups, 2006 assignment.

04 How did the town-government side of the budget grow?

Municipal (Non-Education) Spending Growth vs. Peer Medians

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Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators, ej6f-y2wf (operating_expenditures). Each town’s own series is indexed to 100 at its first reported year; the two dashed lines are the median taken across the peer towns’ indexed series, year by year. Group medians exclude the subject town.

05 How did the school side grow?

Education Spending Growth vs. Peer Medians

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Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators, ej6f-y2wf (education_expenditures). Each town’s own series is indexed to 100 at its first reported year; the two dashed lines are the median taken across the peer towns’ indexed series, year by year. Group medians exclude the subject town. Towns that belong to a regional school district book their education costs differently from towns that run their own schools; that affects comparisons on this measure.

06 What is the level, rather than the growth?

Per-Resident Spending Over Time

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Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators, ej6f-y2wf (total_expenditures ÷ population_state_dept_of_public_health). Nominal dollars, not inflation-adjusted. Population is the CT Department of Public Health estimate carried in the same dataset.

07 Where does this town sit among its peers?

Per-Resident Spending, Latest Reported Year

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Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators, ej6f-y2wf (total_expenditures ÷ population_state_dept_of_public_health), most recent reported fiscal year. Towns the source does not report for that year are omitted rather than charted at zero. Differences between towns reflect what services a town delivers directly as well as how much it spends: education arrangements, regional districts, fire and ambulance service, water and sewer authorities all vary from town to town.

08 How much of the budget is schools, against its peers?

Education as a Share of Total Spending

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Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators, ej6f-y2wf (education_expenditures ÷ total_expenditures). Each peer town’s own share is computed first; the two dashed lines are the median taken across those shares, year by year. Group medians exclude the subject town. All-funds basis, so grant-funded education spending is included in both the numerator and the total.

The data behind these charts

Branford’s own series behind the charts on this page, as text. Each table names the dataset it came from and the year of every row. The peer towns and group medians the charts also plot are not repeated here; they are in the same source files, linked in the footer.

Who Branford is compared with

Surrounding towns 3 towns

East Haven · Guilford · North Branford

The towns that share a border or an immediate labor market. Right for regional context; they are not matched on size or wealth.

District Reference Group D 23 towns

Berlin · Bethel · Clinton · Colchester · Cromwell · East Granby · East Hampton · East Lyme · Ledyard · Milford · New Milford · Newington · North Haven · Old Saybrook · Rocky Hill · Shelton · Southington · Stonington · Wallingford · Waterford · Watertown · Wethersfield · Windsor

The CT State Department of Education grouping of school districts on family income, parent education, family structure and enrollment. Last assigned in 2006, and built for education questions rather than town-side spending.

Municipal peers 12 towns

Stonington · Milford · Southbury · Woodbury · Litchfield · Clinton · Groton · Waterford · Bloomfield · North Branford · Westbrook · Wallingford

Town-side spending, debt, reserves, and tax comparisons. Chosen by a published formula over state data rather than by hand: the nearest towns by standardized distance on the stated variables.

School peers 12 towns

Stonington · Milford · Southbury · Clinton · Bloomfield · Shelton · Woodbury · Litchfield · Waterford · East Windsor · East Haddam · North Branford

Education spending comparisons. Chosen by a published formula over state data rather than by hand: the nearest towns by standardized distance on the stated variables.

Branford is left out of each list above, because a town is never part of the benchmark it is measured against. Group medians elsewhere on the site exclude it the same way. Sources: surrounding towns and District Reference Group are the published groupings; the peer sets are built by a stated formula over CT OPM data (Data/build_peer_sets.py), not selected by hand.

Spending per resident by fiscal year

Spending per resident by fiscal year for Branford, Connecticut
Fiscal year Total expenditures Population Per resident
FY 2013-14$100,416,47128,225$3,558
FY 2014-15$100,724,89128,145$3,579
FY 2015-16$105,369,09428,028$3,759
FY 2016-17$109,986,74928,111$3,913
FY 2017-18$114,953,78728,005$4,105
FY 2018-19$109,950,21627,900$3,941
FY 2019-20$116,024,61428,220$4,111
FY 2020-21$116,622,77528,176$4,139
FY 2021-22$122,557,59528,148$4,354
FY 2022-23$125,031,75128,031$4,460

Per resident is this town's own spending divided by its own population for the same year. It is not one group median divided by another. Source: CT OPM, Municipal Fiscal Indicators (ej6f-y2wf) - audited actuals as filed by each town.

Where Branford sits among all 169 Connecticut towns, FY 2022-23

Where Branford sits among all 169 Connecticut towns, FY 2022-23 for Branford, Connecticut
Measure Branford Rank, lowest to highest Statewide median
Total expenditures per resident$4,460107 of 169$4,217
Education expenditures per pupil$25,957126 of 169$22,590
Equalized mill rate15.31 mills55 of 16917.18 mills
Equalized net grand list per resident$264,555133 of 169$189,668
Total fund balance as a share of total expenditures45.3%164 of 16919.9%
Bonded long-term debt per resident$2,772121 of 169$1,741
Intergovernmental revenue as a share of total revenues9.6%28 of 16920.5%

A rank is a position, not a grade. Which end of the list is preferable depends on the measure and on what a reader is trying to find out. Per-pupil spending here is OPM education expenditures divided by average daily membership, which is not the state Department of Education's Net Current Expenditures Per Pupil. Source: CT OPM, Municipal Fiscal Indicators (ej6f-y2wf) - audited actuals as filed by each town. Ranks computed for FY 2022-23 across all 169 towns.