RUMFORD — Figuring out how to save costs for the remainder of the fiscal year to lessen next year’s tax burden will be discussed at the Board of Selectmen meeting at 7 p.m. in the town hall auditorium.

Chairman Brad Adley said on Wednesday that the board will set goals for Town Manager Carlo Puiia and department heads to achieve.

“Whether it’s 1 percent, 2 percent, 3 percent, 6 percent, or 10 percent, obviously, we’ve got to tighten our budgets,” Adley said, referring to a 22½-percent jump in taxes realized at Monday night’s special selectmen meeting.

The value of the NewPage Corp. mill dropped $93 million and the value of Brookfield Power Co., which was once part of the mill’s holdings, dropped $18 million, causing a reduction in the town’s value from $614 million to $499 million.

That, in turn, spiked the town’s tax rate from $19.60 per $1,000 valuation to $24 per $1,000 valuation, a figure that is expected to be finalized this week when the Board of Assessors sign the tax commitment papers.

In hindsight, Adley said that perhaps town officials should have slowly increased the tax rate a little each year to soften the blow.

“It took people aback,” he said. “To do it all in one fell swoop, it’s an impact.”

That’s why selectmen and Puiia are anticipating questions from residents to be asked during the Requests of Citizens Present session of the meeting. Adley said the board and Puiia will be ready with answers.

The topic will also be addressed later in Thursday night’s agenda, when selectmen discuss cost-savings goals for the current budget year of 2009-10.

Among the other agenda items are getting an update on the Wind Power Moratorium Request, approving an inflow and infiltration project bid, and approving a new crosswalk at Hancock Street and Sagadahoc Avenue.

Adley said he believes the update involves moratorium backers convening a meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 13, and inviting selectmen to attend.

The board will not be discussing the proposal again like they did at their Sept. 17 meeting, when selectmen voted 3-1 not to convene a special town meeting to let residents vote on the petition-driven moratorium on wind power development in Rumford.

“I don’t foresee us revisiting the issue on Thursday,” Adley said.

The inflow and infiltration bid involves an engineering contract to prevent town catch basins from leaking storm water into the sewer system.

“We’ve been working on this for a couple of years,” Adley said. “We’ve got a lot of storm water going into the system and it’s overtaxing the sewer treatment plant in Mexico and we’ve got to get that fixed.”

There are no executive sessions scheduled, but the meeting will be preceded at 5:15 p.m. by a workshop between selectmen and the Library Growth Committee.

“We want to stay in the loop with what’s going on with the library,” Adley said.

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