AUBURN — Wednesday night’s forum gave city councilor-at-large candidates something they haven’t had so far this election — the chance to question each other.

The forum, sponsored by the League of Young Voters, brought all five candidates for the two open seats together for one final debate before Tuesday’s municipal election.

The last 15 minutes of the hour-long event was a round-robin format, letting each candidate put one of their competitors on the spot.

Taxes was one of the big issues. Candidate Ron Potvin, who vowed to keep taxes from rising, asked candidate Joshua Shea his philosophy on taxes.

Shea said he would work to lower taxes, but not if it meant deeper sacrifices in city services.

“I don’t want to live in a town that’s full of crime and poverty because we have the best tax rate in the country,” Shea said. “I am one of those people who’s willing to pay for decent services. And I think that if we explain how our money is being spent to people, they will understand it.”

Potvin answered a similar question from candidate Michael Lemay. Lemay noted that Potvin’s no-taxes stance was the same as some members of the current council that caused controversy this year.

Potvin said he’d only support a tax increase if it goes to a public vote via referendum. He noted that the city lost $3 million in state revenue sharing in 2010 and that contributed as much to the city’s problems as a tax stance did.

“That’s a huge amount to be reduced and still run a city,” Potvin said. “But they did not push the burden on to the taxpayer. That meant a reduction in services. The difference this year is we won’t be losing those revenues.”

About 30 people attended the forum in the basement of the Auburn Public Library. It included sole mayoral candidate Jonathan LaBonte and several of the councilors seeking a seat in one of Auburn’s five wards.

But the focus was the at-large candidates, and they answered many of the questions they’d been asked before — how they would work with the Auburn School Department, what they would do to encourage young adults to make Auburn their home. Lemay said he’d been challenged by some residents for saying that councilors need to respect school officials.

“People said they didn’t like that idea very much because people think they are just bobbing heads for the superintendent,” Lemay said. But his opinion didn’t change. Councilors need to realize that school officials are elected by the same voters that elect the council, he said.

“What they can’t do is operate in a vacuum,” Lemay said. “They have to listen to people other than the schools’ strongest advocates. I know there’s a lot of people that feel the schools should have whatever they want, no matter what. So the schools need to listen to the council and take the people’s opinions into consideration.”

Candidate Jeremiah Bartlett used his round-robin question to ask Belinda Gerry, the only incumbent councilor on Tuesday’s at-large ballot, to talk about problems with the current council.

Gerry said she feels the current council didn’t meet in workshops often enough.

“We did not work as a team, not on the mayor, the manager or the council,” Gerry said. “We gotta have workshops, have goals and set benchmarks for the future.”

For her round-robin question, Gerry challenged Shea to describe what he thought the current council did right.

“Well, the city is still here,” Shea said. He gave the current council respect for dealing with many rough situations.

“All of you deserve a thanks from the community for holding it together,” Shea said. “While there have been a hell of a lot of problems, it could have been a hell of a lot worse.”

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