BETHEL – Selectmen voted 5-0 Monday night to support legislation seeking to change the taxation allocation for Oxford County police service, becoming the first board to do so.

Chairman Harry Dresser Jr. said the proposal would shift 90 percent of the county’s $1.1 million patrol cost in the 2005 budget.

It would shift that amount from the eight municipalities that fund their own police departments to the 28 municipalities that don’t.

“This is about who should bear the responsibility for the bulk of police coverage,” he said. “In no manner is this meant to reflect negatively on the county or the Sheriff’s Department.”

Bethel, Dixfield, Fryeburg, Mexico, Norway, Oxford, Paris and Rumford fund their own police departments.

The municipalities that don’t are Andover, Brownfield, Buckfield, Byron, Canton, Denmark, Gilead, Greenwood, Hanover, Hartford, Hebron, Hiram, Lincoln Plantation, Lovell, Magalloway Plantation, Newry, Otisfield, Peru, Porter, Roxbury, Stoneham, Stow, Sumner, Sweden, the unorganized territories, Upton, Waterford, West Paris and Woodstock.

Town Manager Scott Cole told selectmen that the Oxford County Sheriff’s Department is the de facto police department for towns that don’t have their own police departments.

Cole said that while Bethel uses some of the county’s police-related services such as dispatching, patrol backup and the jail, the county routinely solicits Bethel police to help deputies outside Bethel’s boundaries.

Bethel Chief Alan Carr said his department mainly uses county police as a backup service, while they use Bethel officers likewise.

“We get called a lot to go to Gilead if the sheriff’s deputies can’t get up right away. It’s the same way with state police, because they’re so shorthanded. The only time they come into town is to back us up or to visit,” Carr said.

But, while Bethel pays the county, the county doesn’t reimburse Bethel for having its officers look into things outside of Bethel, Cole said.

In Oxford County, the cost of operating the sheriff’s patrol division is spread across the total taxable value of property within the entire county, through assessment of each municipality’s respective portion of the total.

Currently, the eight municipalities with police departments constitute 46 percent of the total taxable value of the county. The remaining 28 municipalities and unorganized territory constitute 54 percent of the total taxable value.

That means, Dresser said, that taxpayers in the eight municipalities with police departments are “paying a whole pile of money for 28 towns to have police coverage. We’re being billed for something we don’t get, and that doesn’t seem right.”

When contacted Tuesday, Oxford County Chief Deputy Jim Davis said he would not comment on the matter until he could review the resolution and accompanying documents.

Davis is to meet with Cole on Wednesday, Dec. 8, to review the documents. With a 2005 state valuation of almost $262 million, Bethel’s current share of patrol costs is $60,314. Under the proposed 90-10 split, the cost would decrease by $47,274 to $13,040.

Dresser said the 90-10 cost-share ratio was arrived at arbitrarily.

“It’s a made-up acknowledgment that we do benefit from the Sheriff’s Department. It’s a generous acknowledgment, I think,” he said Tuesday.

Selectmen agreed to seek consensus on the matter among a majority of Oxford County municipal officers and legislators in the near future.

Rep. Arlan Jodrey, who attended the meeting, told selectmen that they’d need to submit a title of the bill to the Legislature by Friday, Dec. 17.

But, Jodrey said, he would not back the measure without assurance that a majority of county taxpayers would agree.

“I’ve got to convince other legislators that this is a good idea. Do townspeople want this or selectmen? We may be dealing with this everywhere all over the state, not just Oxford County,” Jodrey said.