NORWAY — Town Manager David Holt has proposed a $2.7 million budget for the next fiscal year that begins July 1. The proposed budget is less than a 3 percent increase over last year’s budget.
The $2,705,305 budget includes a number of “challenges” including what Holt termed as a “dramatic” increase in the town’s share for the Oxford Hills School District budget.
Holt told selectmen that the school’s assessment may increase seven times more than the town’s net increase for the proposed 2012-13 budget.
“It’s unexpected. We didn’t cause it. It’s just there,” said Holt of the Oxford Hills School District assessment’s impact on Norway.
According to figures distributed by the Oxford Hills School District, the school district’s proposed budget of $35,162,603 includes a $964,616 or 6.03 percent increase in local assessments for its eight member towns, including Norway, over the previous fiscal year. The assessment figures show increases in the local share for the school budget ranging from $661 in Oxford to a high of $278,267 in Norway.
The exact impact on Norway taxpayers is not available yet.
Holt said to counteract what he called a “dramatic” increase in the school assessment along with a projected $55,000 decline of state revenues, a $40,000 increase in assessment for retirement payments and costly capital needs for roads and other repairs, he will recommend some changes in the way Norway does business.
For example, the towns of Norway and Paris are now looking at a sharing police departments. Additionally, Norway employees may see a change in their health insurance coverage and there may be a rebidding of the tipping fees at Frost Hill.
The Board of Selectmen and the 14-member Budget Committee that was appointed Monday night will now begin the process of going through each individual department budget. The Budget Committee will meet at 6 p.m. Monday in the town office on Danforth Street to hear details of the Recreation Department’s proposed budget.
Once the budget details are ironed out, the final budget will be presented to Norway voters at a town meeting in June.
ldixon@sunjournal.com
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