PHILLIPS – The town meeting has been scheduled for April 12 and voters will be asked to consider five months of municipal operating expenses from Feb. 1 to June 30, Town Manager Karen Olivieri said Tuesday.

A second town meeting will be held in June to consider funding town government operations from July 1 to June 30, 2009, she said.

Selectmen made the decision to change the town’s financial year from a calendar year that runs from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31 to a fiscal year from July 1 to June 30, she said.

The move makes sense because, among other reasons, it coincides with SAD 58’s fiscal year, she said.

The June town meeting won’t be held until after the vote on school consolidation so that it will be known what’s happening with school district mergers, Olivieri said.

She said selectmen considered putting an article on the warrant for the town meeting but when she investigated how a change from calendar year to fiscal year could occur, she discovered that selectmen have the right to make it.

“It’s a big change,” she said. “Change is difficult.”