Facing a hefty budget override and a slew of other weighty financial issues, the town of Aquinnah is set to close out the Island’s annual town meeting season Tuesday.

Voters in the Island’s smallest town will be asked to approve one of the most challenging budgets in their recent history, with a $375,000 Proposition 2 1/2 override looming over a 52-article warrant that focuses mainly on easing the tax burden.

As the last of the Vineyard towns to hold their annual town meeting, Aquinnah voters also get the final say on the housing bank issue that has captured the Island’s attention and dominated debate since for the past month and a half.

The meeting begins at 7 p.m. in the old town hall. There are 52 articles on the warrant. Longtime moderator Mike Hebert will preside, with 35 voters needed for a quorum.

The annual town election is Wednesday. Polls are open in the town hall from noon to 8 p.m. There are no elected contests, but the critical $375,000 override question looms large.

Town administrator Jeffrey Madison said education expenditures are mainly to blame for the large override this year.

“The override is caused by the increase in the number of kids that we have in the school system,” Mr. Madison said. “It always throws us in an override situation. But the cost of it continues to increase, and when it increases it places an increased burden on the taxpayers here.”

Because the up-Island regional school district and the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School are partially funded on a per-pupil basis, even minor fluctuations in the number of students from Aquinnah attending the Island’s public schools can cause tidal waves in the town’s budget. According to school superintendent Matt D’Andrea, Aquinnah’s enrollment at the regional high school will go from 11 to 12 students next year, and from 40 to 48 students in the up-Island district, which includes the Chilmark and West Tisbury schools.

Mr. Madison said the finance committee spent many long nights going through the budget line by line, looking for areas to recapture money.

“One of the things we had to do to minimize the override was visit some of the previously appropriated monies or designated monies to apply against the tax rate,” Mr. Madison said.

Voters will asked to transfer $7,000 previously appropriated for waterways to defray expenses, as well as $13,000 in public safety and harbor master expenses, and $47,960 designated for a landfill drainage project. They also will be asked to transfer $32,000 previously appropriated for a replacement truck for the highway department and $15,000 previously appropriated for a library parking lot to stabilize the town’s other post-employment benefits liability.

“Those things will have to wait,” Mr. Madison said. “There’s no real appropriations here, we can’t afford to do anything. This was tough, we had a tough budget season.”

Education expenditures don’t end with the budget. The town is also being asked to pay $25,480 to fund its portion of a $1.4 million feasibility study for schematics and design work in connection with a planned regional high school overhaul, as well as $22,559 to replace windows at the Chilmark School, $9,341 to go toward a new roof at the West Tisbury School, and $7,703 for an outdoor decking project at that school.

“It’s a lot of money when you don’t have any money,” Mr. Madison said. “In this town where we don’t have any new growth to defray these expenses, they all add up.”

Beyond education expenses, two warrant articles ask voters to appropriate $15,000 to upgrade assessors’ appraisal software and $10,875 to fund assessment revaluations. The selectmen recently put out a request for proposals to outsource the assistant assessor job. According to Mr. Madison, neither the finance committee nor the board of selectmen recommend the expenditures on the town meeting warrant.

“We’re hoping to outsource that, which would make those expenses unnecessary,” Mr. Madison said.

Beyond finances, the warrant includes six articles that ask voters to approve amendments to Aquinnah’s unique zoning bylaws and townwide district of critical planning concern. The amendments were approved at the Martha’s Vineyard Commission last week, and focus on simplifying the town’s stringent zoning review process according to planning board chairman Peter Temple. The changes will increase exemptions for special permits, make allowances for solar panels, and increase maximum house height for non-visible homes, among other things.

The warrant also includes two articles relating to the creation of a Martha’s Vineyard Housing Bank. The first asks voters to enact the housing bank, which would be a regional entity structured similarly to the Martha’s Vineyard Land Bank for the purpose of preserving and creating year-round housing on the Island. The second warrant article asks voters to fund the bank with 50 per cent of the revenue from the recently-enacted short-term rental tax.

Although all five of the other Island towns have either defeated or backed out of the proposal, the articles remain on the Aquinnah warrant and will be up for a final round of discussions next Tuesday.

Voters will also have the chance to approve a stretch code bylaw that will regulate buildings for effective energy usage. Approving the bylaw will allow the town to qualify as a Massachusetts green community, making it eligible for future green-energy grants. Tisbury and West Tisbury have already been designated green community status.

Ultimately, Mr. Madison said the biggest issues on the warrant center around approving the town budget.

“A lot of it’s perfunctory stuff,” the town administrator said. “The issue is, are the voters going to accept the diligence that has been done by the selectmen and finance committee toward dealing with the budget situation and approve the recommended budget?”

That question, and more, will be answered next Tuesday and Wednesday.