POLAND – Voters at Saturday’s town meeting approved a budget that reduces the amount of money that has to be raised from property taxes by $102,000.

Town Manager Dana Lee referred to the budget that selectmen and the Budget Committee had hammered out as a “maintenance budget” – one that meant no layoffs and yet put nearly $750,000 into capital projects and cut the property tax rate by a quarter of a mill (25 cents per $1,000 of valuation).

Presented with such a deal, townspeople approved spending nearly $6 million – with a little less than $2 million of it coming from property taxes – in just 10 votes, only two of which engendered much debate.

George Sanborn led an attempt to trim $8,800 from the Ricker Memorial Library Trustees’ requested $66,000. He suggested trustees could make better use of the library’s endowment than “sitting on that nest egg.”

Trustee Stan Tetenman explained that things weren’t that simple: The economic downturn has reduced the endowment’s value by a third and lower interest rates meant less of a return on what was left. In addition, the town’s recent ruling that library employees were to be treated as town employees, in pay scale and benefits, bumped the budget upward.

Others argued that reduced funding would mean reduced hours and, in hard times, the last thing you should do is put limits on a resource that was helping people deal with hard times.

Selectman Joe Cimino objected to an article that transferred revenues from the town’s older development districts to support projects in the town’s New Village district. Economic Development Committee Chairman Chuck Finger said the funds were needed now to put in water connector pipes for future development along the Route 26 corridor. Unless the pipes are installed before the Department of Transportation reconstruction project proceeds, it would be five years before cuts could be made in the new pavement.

“That would set us back five years in developing the Village District,” said Finger.

Voters also approved amendments to the town’s land-use code which proponents argued would foster a New England village appearance for the Route 26 corridor.

They approved an ordinance that sets design standards for the district and an ordinance requiring buffers between businesses and residences in the Village District.

Voters rejected an amendment that would allow for 50-foot rights of way to provide access for development of up to four houses on back lots in rural areas of town.

“Zoning shouldn’t be just to help a few developers,” Conservation Commission member Fred Huntress said, adding that the town already has enough back-land development as it is.

Edward Rabasco Jr. served as moderator for the meeting which lasted three and a half hours and drew a total of 197 voters.