TURNER – Taxpayers here have some welcome news, especially considering the subject is taxes: The mill rate is increasing by only .4 for the fiscal year that began July 1.

Total appropriations for the coming year are $387,402 for the county tax, $2,113,385 for the municipality, and $3,937,808 for Turner’s share of the tri-town (Turner-Greene-Leeds) SAD 52 budget.

That $6,438,595 total appropriation is decreased by $1,837,724 by municipal revenue sharing, tree growth and veterans reimbursements, trust fund income, and other income, for a total of $4,600,871 to be raised by the 13.75 mill rate, just .4 higher than last year’s 13.35.

The mill rate translates to a tax rate of $13.75 per $1,000 valuation, or $1,375 for a home assessed at $100,000.

The taxable real estate value for the town is $320,332,150 and personal property is valued at $12,378,082, for a total of $332,710,232. Factoring in the Homestead Exemption, the town’s total tax base is $339,669,932.

In presenting the tax commitment for selectmen’s approval, which it received, Town Manager James Catlin said he was pleased that, “All of the town’s committees had worked diligently to produce a tax increase almost exactly at the rate of inflation – 3 percent.”

Selectmen were pleased with the numbers and Chairman Dennis Richardson spoke for them in thanking, “All of those individuals who have made the tough decisions and given our taxpayers a break.”

In other action, Lt. Glenn Holt of the Androscoggin County Sheriff’s Department told the board he met with Catlin and Fire Chief Mike Arsenault to be certain the town gets all the information it needs from his department to bill insurance companies for fire department responses to automobile accidents. Holt said all the information needed for billing is available on one form from his department, and a copy of that form will be made available to a fire officer at the scene or faxed to the town office, at no charge to the town.

A discussion at the last board meeting blamed the Sheriff’s Department and Maine State Police personnel for not sharing their information, or charging a fee for it, for the fact that the town had not billed for fire department responses to accidents for nearly two years, from August of 2003 to June of 2005. Those were not totally billed, selectmen learned Monday, because of a town policy that directs certain steps be taken for such billings. The final step is selectmen approval to send the bills to a collection agency, and that approval was not obtained.

Selectmen corrected the situation by voting to send all unpaid fire department response bills to a collection agency for the next six months, when the board will review results.

The board approved a resolution of thanks to fire department members Arsenault, Rodney Guptil, Kelly Cooper Arsenault and Jerry Forgues for traveling to Louisa, Va., and returning with a fire truck. Selectmen had approved the purchase of the 1998 Ford F-Series truck with 18,000 miles as a piece of equipment suited to responding to auto accidents.

The truck was on display outside the town office before the selectmen’s meeting Monday.

The purchase of the vehicle has rendered another pumper in the department as unneeded, so the board voted to put it out for sale.

In other matters, the board agreed that whatever work needs to be done on Harlow Hill Road to prevent flooding will be done.