Glossary

Budget & fiscal terms

ACFR — Annual Comprehensive Financial Report

The town's full audited financial report, published annually by Colchester's Finance Department. Includes balance-sheet items (debt, pension, OPEB) that the operating budget does not. If you want the most authoritative numbers on Colchester's long-run fiscal health, this is the document to read.

Adopted budget

The dollar amounts the town and the BOE were appropriated to spend, as approved at the annual May referendum. The "+33.5% over 18 years" headline uses adopted budgets. Distinct from "actual" expenditures (year-end audited spend), which can come in slightly under or over.

Audited / unaudited / projected (actual)

Audited: year-end actual expenditures certified by the town's external auditors. Unaudited: year-end actual figures before the audit closes (the FY 22-23 column in the FY 24-25 budget book). Projected: a mid-year estimate of where actual spending will land (the FY 23-24 column in the FY 24-25 budget book — note the BOE was held flat at adopted in this projection).

BOE — Board of Education

Colchester's elected school board; the line item that funds the public schools. ~73% of the total town budget.

Bonded long-term debt

Money the town has borrowed (typically via municipal bonds) to fund capital projects (school buildings, roads, etc.), repaid over multi-year terms. Colchester's bonded debt was $19.6M at fiscal year-end 2023 (~31% of an annual operating budget).

CAGR — Compound Annual Growth Rate

The smoothed annual rate at which a value grew, accounting for compounding. Colchester's budget CAGR over 18 years is 1.7% — meaning the budget would have reached its FY 24-25 size if it had grown 1.7% every single year.

Capital improvement program / capital projects

Non-recurring spending on long-lived assets (school renovations, new fire trucks, road resurfacing). Often funded via bonds, often outside the operating budget. Not in this analysis — see the ACFR.

Debt service

The annual principal and interest payments on outstanding bonded debt. Colchester pays about $2.3M / year in debt service; this is included in the operating budget's "Debt" line.

Effective rate / equalized mill rate

The mill rate adjusted to reflect each town's grand list relative to current fair market value. CT towns revalue every 5 years; between revaluations the assessed value drifts below market value, so the nominal mill rate creeps up to compensate. The equalized rate normalizes that. The right number for cross-town comparisons. Colchester's equalized rate (FY 22-23) is 19.11 mills; nominal is 26.82.

Fund balance / unassigned fund balance

The town's accumulated reserves (the cushion that can absorb a bad year). GFOA recommends ~17% of operating budget. Colchester's total fund balance at fiscal year-end 2023 was $11.4M (~18% of operating budget); unassigned was $8.3M.

General fund

The main town operating account — what the adopted budget covers. Excludes special revenue funds (sewer, water, etc.) and capital project funds.

Grand list / Net Grand List

The total assessed value of all taxable property in town as of October 1 each year. The mill rate × grand list = the property tax levy. CT assesses property at 70% of fair market value, so a $400,000 home appears on the grand list at $280,000.

Levy / property tax levy

Total dollars collected from property taxes — the largest single revenue stream funding the budget. Computed as grand list × mill rate ÷ 1,000. Climbed from $28.3M (FY 07-08) to $45.5M (FY 24-25).

Mill rate

The property tax rate, expressed as dollars of tax per $1,000 of assessed value. A 28.67-mill rate means $28.67 in tax for every $1,000 of assessed value. On a $400,000 home (assessed at $280,000), the bill is $400,000 × 0.7 × 28.67 ÷ 1,000 = $8,028.

Net grand list

The grand list after subtracting elderly/veteran exemptions, manufacturing equipment exemptions, and similar adjustments. The "net" is the figure used to compute the levy.

Net pension liability

The unfunded portion of the town's pension obligations, recorded on the audited balance sheet. Colchester's net pension liability was $1.35M at fiscal year-end 2023 — small because most obligations are in state-administered systems (MERS, TRS) rather than on the town's books.

Nominal vs. real (inflation-adjusted)

Nominal: dollars at face value in the year they were spent. Real: dollars adjusted for inflation, expressed in constant-dollar (typically FY 07-08) terms. Real per-capita spending fell 13.1% even though nominal per-capita spending rose 31.4% — because CPI inflation was 51.3%.

OPEB — Other Post-Employment Benefits

Retiree health benefits and similar non-pension promises to former employees. The unfunded portion is a balance-sheet liability. Colchester's net OPEB liability was $5.6M at fiscal year-end 2023 — modest because the town has only ~85 town-side employees.

Operating budget

The recurring annual spending plan — salaries, benefits, supplies, services, debt service. Approved at the May referendum. This is what the +33.5% headline describes. Excludes capital projects, grant pass-throughs, and special revenue funds.

Per-capita

Per-resident, computed as budget ÷ population. A "spread the bill evenly across all 15,752 residents" denominator. Useful as a cross-town comparison metric but does not match the lived experience of homeowners (who actually pay the property tax). See also: per-household, per-homeowner-household.

Per-household / per-homeowner-household

Alternatives to per-capita that use the count of households (ACS B11001, 6,388 in 2024) or the count of owner-occupied housing units (ACS B25003, 4,887 in 2024) as the denominator. Closer to "per actual property-tax payer." Both show greater real declines than per-capita over the 18-year window because households grew faster than population.

Per-pupil expenditure

BOE budget divided by student enrollment (ADM — Average Daily Membership). Rises naturally when enrollment falls (because school costs are partly fixed). Colchester's per-pupil is ~$20,400, below the CT median of ~$25,225.

PILOT — Payment In Lieu Of Taxes

State payment to towns to compensate for tax-exempt property within town borders (state-owned land, hospitals, colleges). A line item in the non-tax revenue category.

Reval / revaluation

The CT-mandated 5-year cycle in which a town reassesses every property to current market value. Colchester revalued in FY 12-13, FY 17-18, and FY 22-23. After a reval the grand list jumps to current values and the mill rate drops to keep total revenue roughly flat.

Reval factor

Ratio of equalized mill rate to nominal mill rate. Close to 1.0 means the town's grand list reflects current market value; close to 0.5 means the grand list is half of fair market value (deep into the reval cycle). Colchester's factor (FY 22-23) is 0.71; peers near 0.55 are deeper into their cycles.

Special revenue funds

Restricted-purpose funds outside the general fund — sewer, water, recreation enterprise funds, grant programs. Not in this analysis; see the ACFR.

TAR — Town Aid Road

State grant program that distributes funds to municipalities for road maintenance based on a formula (population, road miles, etc.). A non-tax revenue line.

Variance (adopted vs. actual)

The difference between actual year-end expenditures and the adopted budget. Colchester's mean absolute variance is 0.64% across 12 audited years — tiny, meaning the adopted budget is a faithful proxy for what was actually spent.

Inflation indices

BEA — Bureau of Economic Analysis

Federal agency that produces national income and product accounts (GDP, deflators, etc.). Source of the State and Local Government Consumption Expenditures Implicit Price Deflator used as a municipal-cost benchmark.

BLS — Bureau of Labor Statistics

Federal agency that produces the CPI, ECI, PPI, and other price/wage indices.

CPI / CPI-U — Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers

The standard "cost of living" index. Annual CPI inflation 2007 → 2024 was +51.3% cumulative. Useful as a baseline but understates the inflation that towns face (which is closer to +55–60% per the indices below).

Cumulative inflation gap

The percentage-point difference between cumulative inflation and Colchester's cumulative budget growth (+33.5%) over the FY 07-08 → FY 24-25 window. Reported as 17.8 pp against CPI-U, 21.2 pp against the BLS ECI for K-12 schools, 24.0 pp against the BLS ECI for state/local government (all functions), and 26.1 pp against the BEA State and Local Government deflator. Visualized in Chart 1d on the main page.

Deflator / implicit price deflator

A price index built from the price changes of a specific basket of goods or services. The BEA's State and Local Government Consumption Expenditures Implicit Price Deflator measures price changes for the things state and local governments actually buy (salaries, benefits, paving, gasoline, etc.); +59.6% over the analysis window.

ECI — Employment Cost Index

BLS index that tracks total compensation (wages + benefits) costs for employers, broken down by industry and sector. Two ECI series are used here: state/local K-12 schools (FRED CIS3016110000000I, +54.7% cumulative) and state/local government across all functions (FRED ECIGVTCOM, +57.5% cumulative).

FRED — Federal Reserve Economic Data

The St. Louis Federal Reserve's open economic-data portal. Hosts re-distributed BEA, BLS, and Census series with stable IDs and CSV downloads. Most of the inflation/income series in this analysis are pulled via FRED.

FRED series IDs (inflation indices used here)

A829RD3A086NBEA — BEA State & Local Government Consumption Expenditures Implicit Price Deflator (annual, base 2017 = 100). CIS3016110000000I — BLS Employment Cost Index, State & Local Gov't K-12 Schools, Total Compensation (quarterly, base Dec 2005 = 100; annual averages used here). ECIGVTCOM — BLS Employment Cost Index, State & Local Gov't all functions, Total Compensation (quarterly, base Dec 2005 = 100). All three pulled 2026-05-10.

Implicit price deflator

See "Deflator."

Municipal cost inflation / municipal inflation rate

Shorthand for the price level of the goods and services that state and local governments actually buy — wages, benefits, paving, gasoline, utilities, professional services, special-ed contracts — as opposed to the consumer basket measured by CPI-U. Three alternatives carried alongside CPI in this analysis: the BEA State & Local Government Consumption Expenditures Implicit Price Deflator (+59.6% cumulative; the standard benchmark), the BLS Employment Cost Index for state/local government across all functions (+57.5%), and the BLS Employment Cost Index for state/local K-12 schools (+54.7%). All three exceed CPI-U (+51.3%) over the same window because compensation- and service-heavy municipal baskets inflate faster than the consumer basket.

State & Local Government Consumption Expenditures Implicit Price Deflator

The BEA price index for state and local government purchases of goods and services, derived from NIPA Table 3.10.4 (FRED A829RD3A086NBEA). Treated here as the canonical "municipal cost inflation" benchmark; +59.6% cumulative over FY 07-08 → FY 24-25.

NIPA — National Income and Product Accounts

The BEA framework used to measure the U.S. economy (GDP and its components). Table 3.10.4 contains the state and local government implicit price deflator used in this analysis.

PPI — Producer Price Index

BLS index that tracks prices received by domestic producers for their output. Mentioned in METHODOLOGY as one of the alternative deflators considered for F3/F9; the BLS Educational Services PPI is narrow (mostly higher-ed and computer training) so it wasn't used as the main benchmark.

Real wage / real income / real spending

Income or spending divided by an inflation index — i.e., expressed in constant-dollar purchasing power. "Real per-capita spending fell 13.1%" means after dividing by CPI, per-resident spending declined.

Census & demographics

ACS — American Community Survey

Annual nationwide rolling survey by the U.S. Census Bureau, filling in the gaps between decennial censuses. Two products are relevant:

ACS 1-year

Single-year estimates published only for places with population ≥ 65,000. Connecticut as a state qualifies; Colchester (population ~15,800) does NOT, so no ACS 1-year is available for Colchester. Used here for the CT statewide median income series via FRED MEHOINUSCTA646N.

ACS 5-year

5-year-pooled estimates published for all geographies — the only direct Colchester-specific income/household source. The "release year R" estimate is built from sampling years R-4 through R, centered around R-2. Used here for Colchester median income (B19013), households (B11001), tenure (B25003), and population (B01003).

B01003 / B11001 / B19013 / B25003

Specific Census ACS table codes. B01003_001E = total population. B11001_001E = total households. B19013_001E = median household income (past 12 months, inflation-adjusted to release year). B25003_002E / B25003_003E = owner-occupied / renter-occupied housing units.

Decennial Census

The full population count taken every 10 years (2010, 2020, 2030, …) — a hard count, not a sample. Used here for the April 1, 2010 (16,068) and April 1, 2020 (15,555) population values.

FIPS code

Federal Information Processing Standard codes for geographies. Colchester town has state FIPS 09 (Connecticut), county FIPS 011 (New London — pre-2022) or 180 (Southeastern Connecticut Planning Region — 2022+), county-subdivision FIPS 15910. The 2022 county-FIPS change is why Census API queries need different parameters for different release years.

Household

An occupied housing unit, regardless of who lives in it. ACS counts vacant units separately. Total households = owner-occupied + renter-occupied.

Interpolation

Filling in missing data points by drawing a straight line (or curve) between adjacent known values. The published Colchester population series interpolated 11 of 18 years between Census decennial counts and ACS / DPH estimates. The F10 sensitivity test confirmed the headline holds when interpolated values are replaced with sourced ones.

PEP — Population Estimates Program

Census Bureau's annual July 1 population estimates between decennial censuses. The basis for CT DPH's published town-population estimates.

Planning Region (CT)

CT replaced its 8 historic counties with 9 Planning Regions as a county-equivalent geography for federal statistical purposes, effective with the 2022 ACS release. Colchester is in the Southeastern Connecticut Planning Region (FIPS 09180).

Tenure

Census term distinguishing owner-occupied from renter-occupied housing units (table B25003).

Education & staffing

ADM — Average Daily Membership

The official enrollment count used in CT education funding formulas. Slightly different from "October 1 enrollment" because it adjusts for transfers during the year.

Assistant Superintendent

A district-level administrator second to the Superintendent. Colchester explicitly carried this title from FY 2022-23 onward (Hewes through FY 23-24, Kuckel from FY 24-25). Pre-FY 22-23 the equivalent function was carried by the Director of Teaching and Learning.

Central Office

District-wide leadership separate from the four school buildings — Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent (when present), CFO/Business Director, Directors of Teaching & Learning, Pupil Services, Educational Operations, Information Technology, Human Resources. Not covered by the EdSight FTE Staffing CSVs (which are school-level only). Colchester's named central office count went 5 → 6 → 7 → 5 across the 18-year window.

DRG — District Reference Group

CT State Department of Education classification grouping school districts with similar demographics and income for fair comparison. Colchester is in DRG D, alongside Ellington, Tolland, Ledyard, Montville, and others.

EdSight

The CT State Department of Education's public data portal. Source of the FTE Staffing CSVs (one per year, 2001-02 through 2024-25) used in the staffing analysis. Important limitation: EdSight reports school-level only — central office is not included.

FTE — Full-Time Equivalent

A staffing measure where one full-time worker = 1.0 FTE; a half-time worker = 0.5 FTE. Used so part-time positions don't double-count headcount.

Gen Ed / general education

Mainstream classroom teaching, distinct from special education or ESL. "Gen Ed paraprofessionals" are classroom aides supporting mainstream students.

Headcount vs. FTE

Headcount = number of bodies; FTE = full-time equivalents. A district could have 30 part-time aides at 0.5 FTE each = 30 headcount but 15 FTE.

Instructional Specialist

A classroom-support role (literacy coach, math coach, curriculum coordinator, instructional technology specialist) — directly supports teachers, distinct from administrators.

LEA — Local Education Agency

Federal term for a local school district (or board of education). Colchester is LEA code 28 in CT SDE filings.

NCEP — Net Current Expenditures Per Pupil

The CT-published per-pupil expenditure figure that excludes capital, debt service, and transportation — the standard cross-district comparison metric. Used in the education budget comparison page.

Para / Paraprofessional

Classroom support staff (aides, instructional assistants) who are not certified teachers. The FY 24-25 Gen Ed Para spike (33 → 89 FTE, +170%) is documented in Finding 3.5 — likely ESSER-funded based on timing alignment.

Sped — Special Education

Programs and staff serving students with IEPs (Individualized Education Programs). Includes Sped teachers, Sped paraprofessionals, related services. Sped staffing grew +21.6% over the analysis window even as overall enrollment declined 31.6%.

SSP — Strategic School Profile

An older CT SDE annual report that included an FTE breakdown for each district, including a "District Central Office" row. Embedded in older Colchester BOE budget books (FY 10-11 through FY 13-14). Stopped being embedded in newer books, which is why central office FTE has to be cross-checked against the named-position list on each book's title page.

Student-to-teacher ratio

Enrollment ÷ teacher FTE. Colchester improved from 14.1:1 to 11.8:1 over the window because teachers declined less proportionally than enrollment.

Federal programs & aid

ARP / ARPA — American Rescue Plan Act (2021)

The third major COVID relief package, the source of ESSER III funding. Signed March 2021. Colchester's ARP ESSER III allocation: $2,279,789.

CARES Act — Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (2020)

The first major COVID relief package, source of ESSER I funding. Colchester's ESSER I: $211,529.

COLA — Cost-of-Living Adjustment

The annual inflation-driven percentage increase applied to Social Security benefits. Set by the SSA based on the CPI-W. The income-vs-spending page reconstructs a $1,000-in-2007 monthly benefit by applying each year's COLA in sequence.

CRRSA — Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act (2020)

The second major COVID relief package (December 2020), source of ESSER II funding.

ESSER — Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund

Three-tranche federal emergency education funding (ESSER I via CARES, ESSER II via CRRSA, ESSER III via ARP). Funds had to be obligated by September 30, 2024 (ESSER III). Colchester's total ESSER package was approximately $3.4M.

GEER — Governor's Emergency Education Relief Fund

A smaller federal pandemic-era education fund administered by state governors, distinct from ESSER. Mentioned in CT SDE allocation tables.

IDEA — Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

Federal special-education funding statute. IDEA grants flow to local districts and partly fund Sped staff. A grant pass-through, not in the local adopted budget.

SS — Social Security

The federal old-age, survivors, and disability insurance program. Used here as a benchmark for what an inflation-indexed retirement benefit looks like over the same 18-year window.

Title I (of ESEA)

Federal grant program for districts serving low-income students. Title I share is the formula basis for ESSER allocations. A grant pass-through, not in the local adopted budget.

Connecticut agencies

CCM — Connecticut Conference of Municipalities

An association of CT towns and cities; publishes municipal-finance research and lobbies the General Assembly. Cited in the methodology as the source for the "$820 million in missed inflationary adjustments statewide since 2013" ECS gap statistic.

CHFA — Connecticut Housing Finance Authority

State authority that publishes housing market data, including median sale prices. Originally cited as the source for median home prices; the actual underlying dataset is hosted on data.ct.gov as Real Estate Sales from CT OPM.

CT DPH — Connecticut Department of Public Health

State agency that publishes annual July-1 population estimates for all 169 CT towns. Source of the population values used in per-capita math.

CT OPM — Connecticut Office of Policy and Management

State budget and policy agency. Publishes the Municipal Fiscal Indicators dataset (audited town financials), the Mill Rates dataset, the Net Grand List by Town dataset, and the Real Estate Sales dataset — all used heavily in this analysis.

CT SDE — Connecticut State Department of Education

State education agency. Publishes EdSight (FTE Staffing reports, Strategic School Profiles), district performance data, and ESSER allocation tables.

MERS — Municipal Employees' Retirement System

State-administered pension system that covers most non-teacher municipal employees in participating CT towns. Because MERS is state-administered, town-side pension liabilities recorded on local balance sheets are smaller than a citizen might expect.

NCES — National Center for Education Statistics

Federal education statistics agency. Source of the Common Core of Data district-level reports cross-referenced for verification.

NCTQ — National Council on Teacher Quality

National research nonprofit cited in the ESSER paraprofessional discussion (Finding 3.5).

TRS — Teachers' Retirement System

State-administered pension system that covers CT public-school teachers. Like MERS, this means most teacher pension obligations are on the state's books, not the town's.

Data & methodology terms

Apples-to-apples comparison

A comparison where every data point is on the same definitional basis. Adopted-to-adopted across all 18 years is apples-to-apples. Adopted-vs-actual within a single year is apples-to-apples (same line items, same year). Comparing adopted-budget-derived per-capita against OPM-actuals-derived per-capita is NOT apples-to-apples (different sources, different basis), so the F5 review uses OPM actuals across all 15 peer towns to remove that confound.

Counterfactual

A "what would have happened if X" calculation. The F8 levy-share decomposition uses a counterfactual: "if non-tax revenue had grown at the budget's +33.5% rate, what would the levy share be?" Answer: 60.36% — i.e., all of the +12.30 pp shift is mechanically attributable to non-tax revenue lagging.

Cumulative gap

Sum of yearly differences over a multi-year window. The "$45.8M cumulative ECS gap" sums the year-by-year gaps between actual ECS and CPI-projected ECS across all 18 years.

Decomposition

Splitting a single number into its component contributors. The +12.30 pp levy-share rise decomposes into ECS lag (8.43 pp) + other non-tax revenue lag (3.87 pp).

Equalized

Adjusted to a common standard for cross-comparison. CT's "equalized mill rate" normalizes for revaluation timing.

Footnote

Throughout the HTML pages, italicized text below a chart or stat tile that discloses methodology, sources, or caveats. If you only read the footnotes, you'll catch most of what the analysis got wrong on the first pass and corrected on the second.

Indexed series / index value

A series rebased so a chosen reference year = 100. Useful for visualizing growth rates across series of different magnitudes on the same chart. The "Budget Growth vs. Inflation" chart indexes both budget and CPI to 100 in FY 07-08.

Listyear (CT OPM Real Estate Sales convention)

The grand-list year a transaction was assigned to (October 1 of year Y to September 30 of year Y+1). OPM does not publish a listyear for the year immediately preceding each Colchester revaluation, which is why listyears 2011, 2016, and 2021 contain zero records — F11 documents the workaround using daterecorded instead.

Median vs. mean

Median: the middle value when the data is sorted. Mean: the average. Median is preferred for skewed data like home prices and household income because a few extreme values can pull the mean up. This analysis uses medians throughout for prices and incomes.

Pp — percentage points

The arithmetic difference between two percentages. From 60.4% to 72.7% is a "12.3 pp" rise, NOT a "12.3% rise." Distinct from "percent change" — a 12.3-pp rise from 60.4% is a +20.4% relative change.

Pro-rata estimate

An estimate based on proportional allocation. Colchester's ESSER II allocation isn't directly published, so it's estimated as Colchester's Title I share (~0.21%) times the CT total ESSER II ($443M) = ~$940K.

Real (vs. nominal)

See "Nominal vs. real" above.

Sensitivity test

A robustness check that re-runs a calculation with a different input to see how much the result changes. F10's sensitivity test recomputed the −13.1% real per-capita decline using authoritative DPH/Census values for 11 interpolated years; result was identical (−13.16%), confirming the headline doesn't depend on the interpolation.

Spot-check

Manual verification of a small sample of the underlying numbers against source documents. The author spot-checked every headline number in the README and HTML pages against source PDFs and authoritative datasets.

Time-series

A sequence of measurements taken at successive time points (one value per fiscal year, here). Most of the arrays in data-dictionary.md are 18-value time-series spanning FY 07-08 through FY 24-25.

YoY — Year-over-year

The percent change from one year to the next. Chart 2 ("Annual Budget Increase vs. Annual Inflation Rate") plots YoY growth.

Specific datasets cited

5mzw-sjtu — CT OPM Real Estate Sales 2001-2023 GL

Every CT real-property sale ≥ $2,000 between October 1 and September 30 of each grand-list year. Source for median Colchester single-family home sale prices. data.ct.gov/.../5mzw-sjtu

ej6f-y2wf — CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators 2014-2023

Audited town-by-town financials for all 169 CT municipalities. Source for actual expenditures, equalized mill rates, audited fund balance, bonded debt, OPEB, and pension liability figures. data.ct.gov/.../ej6f-y2wf

emyx-j53e — CT Mill Rates for FY 2014-2026

Town-by-town nominal mill rates by fiscal year. Used for the regional/peer mill rate comparisons. data.ct.gov/.../emyx-j53e

webp-fgt3 — CT OPM Net Grand List by Town

Year-by-year residential / commercial / motor-vehicle / personal-property breakdowns of each town's grand list. Source for the residential-vs-commercial split chart on the income-vs-spending page.

FRED A829RD3A086NBEA

BEA State and Local Government Consumption Expenditures Implicit Price Deflator. The municipal-cost inflation benchmark used in the F3 review. fred.stlouisfed.org/.../A829RD3A086NBEA

FRED CIS3016110000000I

BLS Employment Cost Index for State & Local Government, Elementary and Secondary Schools, Total Compensation. The K-12-employer-specific wage-cost benchmark used in the F9 review. fred.stlouisfed.org/.../CIS3016110000000I

FRED ECIGVTCOM

BLS Employment Cost Index for State and Local Government, all functions, Total Compensation. Cross-check on the BEA S&L deflator and the K-12 ECI. fred.stlouisfed.org/.../ECIGVTCOM

FRED MEHOINUSCTA646N

U.S. Census Bureau Median Household Income for Connecticut (statewide, ACS 1-year). The CT statewide income series used as the original burden-chart denominator. fred.stlouisfed.org/.../MEHOINUSCTA646N

Zillow ZHVI — Zillow Home Value Index

Zillow's smoothed estimate of the typical home value in a given geography. Used as a cross-check on the OPM-derived Colchester median sale prices for revaluation years (the OPM-recorded-sales medians are the primary source; ZHVI is reference). The two methodologies differ — ZHVI is Zestimate-based, OPM is recorded-sales-based — so they don't track each other tightly.

Raw dataset downloads

colchester_tax_breakdown.json (7.0 KB)

FY 2007-08 → FY 2024-25 Colchester grand-list composition and headline budget figures. Fields per fiscal year: real_residential, real_commercial, real_industrial, personal_property, motor_vehicle, total_grand_list, tax_levy, total_budget. FY 22-23 and FY 23-24 tax levy values are null (budget PDFs not in source folder); FY 24-25 grand-list categories are null (OPM publishes ~September after fiscal year end). FY 2007-10 grand-list categories are estimated from FY 2010-11 ratios applied to reference residential values — see metadata.notes. Underlies the residential-vs-commercial grand-list composition chart and the locally-funded budget share decomposition on the income-vs-spending page. Does not contain BOE/town-side splits, ECS, mill rate, or population — those live in inline page JavaScript and are sourced separately from the Colchester adopted budget PDFs, OPM Mill Rate dataset (emyx-j53e), and CT DPH population estimates.
Source: CT OPM Net Grand List (webp-fgt3) and Colchester adopted budget PDFs in BudgetPdfs/.

town_education_ratios.json (19 KB)

FY 2014-15 → FY 2023-24 audited per-town expenditure totals for a 16-town peer set (Colchester, Lebanon, Salem, Bozrah, East Haddam, Hebron, Marlborough, Montville, East Hampton, Cromwell, Portland, Tolland, Ellington, Somers, Suffield, Granby). Fields per town/year: total (Total Expenditures), education (Education Expenditures), ratio (education share of total). Feeds the "Education spending as % of total municipal expenditures" comparison charts on the Education Comparison page. Does not contain nominal or equalized mill rates, per-resident spending, or the 15-town peer set used by the home-page mill rate charts — those are embedded inline in the page JavaScript and sourced separately from OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators (ej6f-y2wf, different columns of the same dataset). The peer set in this file overlaps the home-page peer set on 11 of 15 towns.
Source: CT OPM Municipal Fiscal Indicators dataset (ej6f-y2wf), pulled 2026-05-10. Compiled directly from https://data.ct.gov/resource/ej6f-y2wf.json.

education_per_pupil_peer_data.json (20 KB)

Per-town education and tax series for Colchester and 15 demographic peers (Lebanon, Hebron, East Hampton, East Haddam, Marlborough, Bozrah, Salem, Ellington, Tolland, Suffield, Plainfield, Wolcott, South Windsor, Ledyard, plus Cromwell). Fields per town: ncep (Net Current Expenditures per Pupil, FY 15-16 → FY 24-25), adm (Average Daily Membership / enrollment, same range), nce (Net Current Expenditures, same range), and mill_rate (nominal mill rate, FY 15-16 → FY 25-26). Also includes colchester_boe_budget (adopted BOE budget, FY 15-16 → FY 25-26) at the file root. Series-by-series coverage may vary — the per-pupil reports (NCEP/ADM/NCE) stop at FY 24-25 because EdSight has not yet published FY 25-26; mill rates and the BOE adopted budget extend one year further. No demographic fields (income, population, etc.) — those were in an earlier draft and have been removed. Feeds the per-pupil cost and enrollment-trend charts on the Education Comparison page.
Source: CT SDE EdSight per-pupil reports (NCEP/ADM/NCE), OPM Mill Rate dataset emyx-j53e (mill rates), and Colchester adopted budget books (BOE budget). Originally _data.json in the site root — copied here under a descriptive name.

Want the underlying budget PDFs, Excel workbooks, raw EdSight CSVs, or the Lockton consultant pages? They're in the project repository (BudgetPdfs/, EduBudgetPdfs/, StaffLevels/, LocktonPages/, and the two .xlsx files at the root). Email john.e.farrell@gmail.com for a tarball or pointer if you don't have repo access.