OTISFIELD – Selectmen set the town’s tax rate at $17.50 per $1,000 of property value at Wednesday’s meeting.

The rate is lower than the $17.59 for the 2003-2004 year, but higher than the amount needed to raise the 2004-2005 tax commitment.

Selectman Lenny Adler explained that assessors are able to raise an assessors’ overlay of up to 5 percent more than the budgeted amount. The assessors’ overlay for this year will be $25,000 beyond the town’s tax commitment.

Adler said the overlay will help cushion the blow of the Palesky tax cap “if it comes.” In a discussion of the tax cap, Adler said that the town is “in excellent shape” financially. With about $500,000 currently in surplus, Adler estimated that the town will be able to run for another year or two before encountering major financial problems if the 1 percent tax cap passes.

Residents at the meeting expressed concern about the tax cap and asked that selectmen hold an informational meeting on the issue. No date was set.

In other business, selectmen opened bids for construction of a salt storage shed. Of the three bids, the lowest was $6,300. As the town has appropriated only $2,500 for the project, selectmen rejected all bids and began to consider other options. There were offers of volunteer labor from the public, but no plans were made.

During the open forum, Gordon Chamberlain, acting chairman of the Otisfield Citizens’ Action Committee, suggested raising the fee for a junkyard permit from $60 to $1,000 a year.

“We feel that this measure, along with more stringent code enforcement, would go a long way in reducing the number of illegal or unlicensed junkyards throughout Otisfield,” he wrote in a letter he read to selectmen.

“How is that going to reduce the number of unlicensed junkyards?” Adler asked about the proposed fee increase.

Chamberlain said more code enforcement would be the main deterrent to unlicensed junkyards. He said he had also spoken to Mark Latti, spokesman for state Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, about asking hunters to report unlicensed junkyards. Chamberlain theorized that people are posting their land to keep junkyards from being discovered.

Adler replied that although he has never posted his land, “if I thought hunters were half hunting and half seeing what I had on my land, it would be posted tomorrow.”