WALES — Residents in Litchfield, Sabattus and Wales will vote on a $17.7 million RSU 4 budget in a referendum Tuesday, after giving initial approval Wednesday to the budget recommended by the school board.

Superintendent Jim Hodgkin said 50 people turned out Wednesday night at Oak Hill High School, some with concerns.

An hour later, by a show of hands, the majority passed the $17,749,537.98 budget, a 0.85 percent increase over the current year.

“The basic sentiment that I’m hearing from people who are not going to be able to support the budget isn’t that they think the budget is outrageous; they just can’t afford it,” Hodgkin said. “They’re not angry about it. They don’t blame the board. They just say they can’t afford it.”

The 2013-14 school year budget would add 99 cents to the tax rate in Litchfield, $1.63 in Sabattus and $1.44 in Wales.

On a $150,000 home, that’s an increase to property tax bills of $148.95 in Litchfield, $245.18 in Sabattus and $216.60 in Wales, in addition to any increases from the municipal budgets.

Sabattus Town Manager Andrew Gilmore said he’ll be keeping an eye on tax collections and the number of people who can’t pay their bills or pay late in his town.

“These things rarely go down,” Gilmore said. “They tend to only increase over time, so if we get such a large climb in one year, what does that mean for the subsequent years? I’m really nervous about that. We have not had the tax base expansion to keep pace with the tax increase and that is of great concern to me.”

The new school budget cuts 8.7 teaching positions. It also includes plans for the district to become one of the first in the state to give laptops and iPads to every student in K-12 by working with funds freed up by expiring contracts.

Largely behind the tax increase: $222,000 set aside for Maine State Retirement, newly proposed by the state, and an anticipated $446,000 shortfall in state funding. Both are part of Gov. Paul LePage’s budget, which is still being negotiated in Augusta.

If the district doesn’t have to pay for retirement, it would also see the loss of some revenue, Hodgkin said, for net savings of about $120,000. That money would be tucked away for reserves next year.

If the state funding were to come through before June 30, that would be applied to lower tax bills, he said.

Over the past five years, the three towns have been asked to pick up $2.7 million that had been paid by the state.

“This may be the most difficult budget to ask people to support, but it’s probably the easiest one to explain,” Hodgkin said. “The budget is down half a million dollars from where it was five years ago, but the impact on the taxpayers is ridiculously high because we just continue to lose funding from the state.”

Polls will be open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday, June 11, at the Wales Town Office, Sabattus Town Office and Sportsmen’s Club in Litchfield.

kskelton@sunjournal.com

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