FAYETTE – Four candidates are vying for two town selectmen’s positions that opened when David Pollock and Tim Walton resigned last spring. Fayette residents will vote in a special election today.

The town has been grappling with several resignations as a result of issues with the town’s accounting system. Two budget committee members, two selectmen and the town manager have all resigned recently, though not all cited the accounting issues as their reason for leaving.

Town Manager Jim Collins left after residents voted to reduce an administrative budget that included his and other town employees’ salaries by $10,000 at the annual town meeting June 12.

Briane Coulthard, the town’s school superintendent, took over as the interim town manager in July to assure that school and town employees and the town’s bills are paid in a timely manner.

“He took it personally,” said Coulthard in an interview Monday about Collins’ response to the town’s vote on the budget.

Coulthard said the issue centers on discrepancies that are a result of a new computer accounting system.

“Selectmen had not been receiving financial reports for several months,” he said.

He said Collins claimed that the system change and a lack of technical assistance to get it running was the cause for the absence of information.

The school was “caught up” in the situation because it does its own bookkeeping but relies on the town manager to sign checks. The school’s accounting system and the town’s cannot be easily reconciled, he said.

The three remaining selectmen have conducted first interviews for a new town manager. Three candidates have been selected for second interviews, which will take place Thursday after two new selectmen are installed.

Running for the two open selectmen’s spots are Gerald Mitchell, Berndt Graf, Thomas Welch and Joseph Young.

Welch served as a selectman for six years before being voted out in June 2003.

He said his main concerns are to keep taxes from going up and to keep the town’s financial books straight. He also said he wanted to be a part of the hiring process for the new town manager.

Graf has been living in Fayette since the early 1980s. He and his family own Stanmere Farm. He has had experience on the school board in Mt. Vernon and was the chairman of the Planning Board. He wants to hire a town manager with municipal government experience who has good computer and accounting skills. It would also be nice to find someone who lived in town to fill the position, he said.

He feels that the infighting that has plagued the town’s government needs to stop.

“We, as selectmen, need to start acting like adults,” he said.

Mitchell has lived in Fayette his entire life and would like to keep property taxes down, he said. He has served on the budget committee for the past year and wants to be involved in the fire station project. He has been regularly attending selectmen’s meetings; his brother, Tom, currently serves on the board, he said.

Young, who served on the budget committee for five years but resigned over the accounting issues in the spring, said: “We’ve been running the town of Fayette by the seat of our pants.” Young has been self-employed for 15 years and wants to see the budget and accounting issues resolved.

Polls will be open from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. at Starling Hall on Route 17.

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