By DOUG HARLOW
Staff Writer
SKOWHEGAN — Residents at Monday’s annual Town Meeting agreed to spend $1,078,945 for the Police Department, $716,151 for the Fire Department, $796,204 for solid waste management, $884,00 for debt retirement, and a total of $1.25 million for summer roads, winter roads and vehicle maintenance.
Voters also agreed to spend $97,867 for the Skowhegan Free Public Library, but were split on funding requests for several social service agencies.
Monday’s meeting was a time to catch up with spending cuts made over the past few years in order to keep taxes down, the town manager said last week.
The budgets recommended by the Board of Selectmen and the town Budget Committee would have put the town budget 5.5 percent to 6 percent higher than the current year’s, but voters’ reduction of some requests made the increase difficult to calculate immediately.
At the beginning of the meeting, finance officer Christine Almand posted on a projected computer screen projections for taxation if all items were to be passed as written.
The tax rate, including county and schools, was projected to be $16.49 for every $1,000 in property valuation. The current tax rate is $15.86, meaning the owner of a $100,000 home paid $1,586 in property taxes this year.
A police officer’s position, which had been cut last year, was put back into the budget Monday night, as was a full-time employee at the transfer station and another in Public Works, plus a part-time employee in the front office. Voters also agreed to take $756,864 from surplus to off set taxes in the coming year.
In voting on the funding for social service agencies, residents agreed to spend $10,000 for Coburn Park and $5,000 for Skowhegan History House, as each had requested, but shot down the $24,000 requested by the Chamber of Commerce, opting for $14,000 instead.
Voters approved $1,500 requested for Kennebec Valley Community Action Program transportation, but cut its child development program from the requested $13,700 to $8,000. The $18,750 for the Family Violence Project was whittled down by voters to $4,500, and the $3,757 requested for the newly formed Sexual Assault Crisis and Support Center was cut to $1,500.
Hospice Volunteers was granted the requested $5,000, as was $7,766 for Spectrum Generations.
In voting on the town’s capital reserve funds, or savings accounts for future emergencies and unforeseen expenses, residents again were asked to replace money that either had been cut or was not raised in previous years.
All 18 of the related capital reserve articles passed as written.
Budget Committee member Robert Washburn cautioned residents that the committee had voted 4-3 on the reserve accounts as a bundle, not individually. He suggested residents question and discuss the articles.
Voters wondered why $20,000 was needed in the reserve accounts for emergency management. Town Manager John Doucette Jr. explained that the article was a one-time spending line to hook new radios to the new emergency radio towers.
In the next article, residents questioned what “catastrophic wages” were in the request for $10,000 in capital reserve.
Jay Mase, chairman of the Board of Selectmen, said the money was for hiring a temporary replacement to a town employee who might suddenly go out sick. She said such a thing happened last year in the Fire Department and selectmen had to move money to cover the expense from another account.
“You can’t budget for all that,” Mase said. “You never know when it’s going to happen.”
Washburn said $10,000 was too much, but voters agreed to pass the article as written.
Residents also voted, with some opposition in the show-of-hands vote, to spend $100,000 under capital reserve accounts for the Assessor’s Department for a property revaluation.
Doucette said there hasn’t been a townwide revaluation of homes since about 1992. Mase said it will cost $500,000-$600,000 to complete and that $250,000 is still needed.
“How is a revaluation going to help me?” one resident asked.
Selectman Newell Graf said it will help everyone because the process will be fair to all.
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