PARIS – The Maine Department of Education is footing part of the bill for a sidewalk to be built in front of the new Paris Elementary School on High Street.

The town is paying $150,000, approved in the last town meeting, Town Manager Sharon Jackson said. The Maine Department of Transportation agreed to pay $300,000 to cover the rest of the estimated $450,000 cost.

Then the total cost rose to $600,000, thus increasing the town’s share, Jackson said.

The Department of Education pitched in $80,000 so town officials wouldn’t have to go back to taxpayers about the issue, Superintendent of SAD 17 Mark Eastman said.

And the remaining $70,000 is being paid by the state transportation department.

Jackson said the sidewalk issue didn’t pass the first time it was brought up two years ago at town meeting. However it did pass the second time.

The sidewalk will extend along High Street in front of the school, Eastman said.

It will not be ready when pupils and staff move into the new school in February.

“This is still about six months away from actually getting a bid,” Eastman said.

The district hopes to do construction next summer and have the sidewalk open in September 2007.

Paris Elementary will house kindergarten through sixth grade pupils from Mildred Fox Elementary in Paris, where kindergarten through third-graders attend, and Madison Avenue Elementary in Oxford, where fourth- through sixth-graders attend.