On Friday, 10 days after a special town meeting was held and townspeople voted to disband the Bethel Police Department in favor of contracting for police services with the Oxford County Sheriff’s Department, a majority of selectmen declined to ratify that vote.

There was a worry, selectmen learned, that they and the town could be accused of misappropriating funds by using the money raised at town meeting to fund the police department to contract for police coverage instead.

Bethel has been talking about disbanding the police department and contracting with Oxford County for police services for years, and this is the first mention of liability? And only a chance of liability at that?

If the townspeople voted, last June, to appropriate money to fund the police department, and then later voted to disband that department in favor of contracted police coverage, what’s the problem? Don’t the voters get to decide how their money is spent?

Under this logic, no financial decision made at the June town meeting could be revised until the following annual town meeting. Which makes no sense, because it was at a properly called special town meeting that voters decided to disband the police department and look to the county for coverage. How is that special gathering of less authority that the annual town meeting?

If the townspeople can appropriate money in June to fund the police department, they can certainly decide to appropriate that same money in a different manner later in the fiscal year. They get to decide. It’s their money.

The turnout at the special town meeting wasn’t what it usually is for the annual town meeting, but that doesn’t matter. The meeting was called, voters arrived, and decided —104-89 — to get rid of the PD. It wasn’t an overwhelming vote, certainly, but voters want Bethel’s police department dissolved.

They can hardly be blamed. There’s been considerable trouble in recent years there, with the firing of then Police Chief Darren Tripp in 2004 and the sudden departure of the more recent former Police Chief Alan Carr last year.

Contracting with the Oxford County Sheriff’s Department for police coverage makes sense for this town, which is generally a peaceful place. The Oxford department has a solid working arrangement with State Police to share coverage in great parts of the county, and under the suggested contract would have officers assigned specifically to patrol Bethel, a combination that could safely police the town. Citizens like the idea and voted to go with it.

Selectman Robert Everett said Friday that a June referendum vote should clear it up, and “people will tell us again whether they want it or not.” But the people already told selectmen what they wanted, by voting. Taking the vote a second time seems an invitation to make a different decision, not to affirm the one already made.

The time to question the legality was before the special town meeting was called, not after the vote was decided. By voting not to ratify the police contract, selectmen have ignored the wishes of voters.

What’s the liability for that?

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