AUBURN – Four Budget Committee members heard presentations of several department budgets Monday night with no action to either approve or cut funding. The four members were one short of the minimum to constitute a quorum.

Budget Committee Chairman Paul Labrecque fielded questions about the size of the jail budget from the only taxpayer who came to a public hearing.

Register of Probate John Cleveland presented his $120,573 budget, which is up 7.18 percent form 2004.

Cleveland presented a table showing a contrast between probate department costs in Androscoggin, Kennebec and Penobscot. Those counties have populations similar to that of Androscoggin and similar probate case loads. He said his department operates with the lowest budget, at $117,000. Kennebec’s 2004 budget was $270,000 and Penobscot’s was $333,000. Androscoggin has the fewest probate employees with two. Kennebec has six and Penobscot, five. “No county in Maine has fewer full-time probate employees than we do, including Piscataquis with 17,000 people,” Cleveland said. “In all, I think we have one of the best managed probate offices in the state. Most of the counties in Maine do 25-to-50 percent of the case load we do. York and Cumberland are the exceptions.”

Emergency Management Agency Director Joanne Potvin presented her $127,255 budget, which is down 1.74 percent from 2004.

She said her agency has received nearly $2 million in federal Homeland Security grants for equipment, training and programs for the county and local police and fire departments. “We are FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) at the local level,” she said.

The Budget Committee is next scheduled to meet at 6 p.m. on Dec. 1..000