JAY – Selectmen voted 4-1 to set the tax rate at $13 per $1,000 of property value Monday, which will give the town $305,958.83 in overlay. The rate reflects an 85 cent decrease from last year’s rate.

Selectman Warren Bryant had opposed the vote favoring Town Manager Ruth Marden’s recommendation.

Marden suggested the rate be set at $13.15 per $1,000 of value to have an overlay of $448,266.55.

It would have dropped the rate 70 cents but kept some money to help offset next year’s rate if there’s less anticipated revenue.

The value at Verso Paper mill and its cogeneration power plant increased this year and the reimbursement on business equipment is 100 percent this year, Marden said.

The state has exempted new equipment and machinery that comes in after April 1, 2008, if a business applies for an exemption.

“We need to plan ahead for when it is not 100 percent, it will be 90 percent next year,” Marden said. “We can count on a tax increase next year because of this unless you want to place it at about $13.25 this year and then there would be no guarantee.

Marden said it would be better to stabilize the rate than to have peaks and valleys.

Selectman Tom Goding said taxpayers are going to need more money in their pockets to pay for increases in oil, gas and other items.

“I would hope you keep it as conservative as possible,” said resident Ellen Levesque, also a member of the town’s budget committee. She asked them to keep it as low as they could.

Others requested the same, while some were thinking of a middle ground of $13.05 to $13.10.

The board also voted 4-1, with Goding opposed, to set the reserve police officer wage at $13.79 per hour. It brings the department up to what Livermore Falls pays its reserve officers in an effort to keep reserve officers on staff.

Jay pays $11.25 an hour now for those with a 100-hour reserve officer training and $12.50 for a reserve who has already completed police officer training.

Other towns such as Wilton and Farmington pay $11 an hour, police Chief Larry White said, with the University of Maine at Farmington paying more than $14.

Jay would pay $26.76 for one of its full-time officers to work overtime but if the job goes to a reserve officer, the town could save money, White said.

While they all agreed the job was difficult and deserved the increase pay, Goding said the wage should be set somewhere in the middle of what other towns pay.