JAY – Voters are scheduled Monday to consider a proposed $16 million school and municipal spending package for the 2005-06 fiscal year.
There are 44 articles on the referendum ballot, including election of two selectmen and two School Committee members.
Polls open at 9 a.m. and close at 8 p.m. at the Community Building.
Running unopposed for two three-year selectmen’s terms are incumbents Bill Harlow and Rick Simoneau.
Three people are running for two three-year terms on the School Committee. Those candidates are incumbents Mary Redmond-Luce and Joel Pike, and newcomer Brent DeSanctis.
The town report is dedicated to four residents who died in 2004: Eugene Dubord, Chester Gould, Roland Ouellette and Merle Thompson.
Copies of the report are available at the town office.
There is also an appreciation page in the report dedicated to former Selectman Parker Kinney, thanking him for his years of service to the town.
The town government spending proposal is $5.68 million, which is expected to be offset by $2.1 million in anticipated revenue. That figure represents a $74,830, or 2 percent, decrease from the current year’s budget. Selectmen and the town’s Budget Committee are recommending that all 20 articles related to town government pass.
The plan includes putting an additional $50,000 in reserve for a new firetruck. In the past few years, voters have agreed to put $50,000 into reserve for the truck annually, and this year they are being asked to put $100,000, which is included in the Fire Rescue Department budget, into the reserve account.
Appropriations requested include: $447,245 for town government, a $8,767 increase over existing budget; $85,317 for buildings and grounds, a $3,197 increase from the current budget; $878,000 for the Police Department, a $19,400 increase over existing budget; $252,772 for Fire Department, a $50,812 increase from this year’s budget; $393,200 for sewer repairs and maintenance, an $8,000 increase over existing budget; and $1.3 million for the Highway Department, a decrease of $330,000 from current budget.
On the school side, the proposed spending plan is $10.5 million, which represents a decrease of $101,692, or 1 percent, from the existing $10.6 million operating budget.
If the proposal is approved, the Jay taxpayers would be looking at raising $9.06 million through taxation, which is $567,972 less that what taxpayers raised to support this year’s budget.
Both the Jay School Committee and the Budget Committee recommend approval of all school articles.
The spending proposal sets up reserve accounts and authorizes spending $88,250 from an elevator reserve account to install a fire alarm system at the Jay High School and to end the elevator use account.
Other proposed reserve accounts include a School Department curriculum development reserve, which would be funded by transferring $10,000 from the fiscal year 2005 unexpended balance; and a School Department technology reserve, to be funded by transferring $10,000 from the general fund.
Also, an insurance reserve account is proposed, which would be set up by transferring $98,000 from the existing budget’s unexpended funds, and a retirement reserve account is proposed, which would be funded by transferring $40,000 from the unexpended salary appropriations from the current year.
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