WEST PARIS – Selectmen this week unanimously approved a tax rate of $15.30 for each $1,000 of assessed property value.

Town Manager John White said, “Last year it was set at $16.60 so it is down $1.30.”

Selectmen said they were pleased with the figures.

“I like the overlay that we will have at that rate so I will move we approve the $15.30 figure for next year,” Selectman Wade Rainey said Thursday.

Although the new tax rate is down from last year, selectmen have had to double land values in an attempt to meet the state requirement for the overall tax commitment, which the state wants to see close to 100 percent of the town’s state valuation. White said the town is still below the state minimum of at least 90 percent.

“We still are not up to the state’s goals,” he said. “We’re only at about 84 percent.”

Because of this, selectmen will be looking at a possible townwide revaluation in 2008.

In other business, selectmen gave Fire Chief Norman St. Pierre the go-ahead to have transmission work done on Engine 5, a 1998 model.

Selectman Dennis Henderson plans to begin a search for a company that repairs fire trucks because the Fire Department’s Engine 1, a 1979 pumper, has a leaking transmission and tank.

St. Pierre said Ripley & Fletcher Co. in Paris does not do that work.

Henderson agreed to find a company, for the best price and a time when it can be done.