MECHANIC FALLS — Voters approved all nine of the articles set before them in Tuesday’s referendum on the town’s municipal budget for the fiscal year that began July 1.
The nine articles passed by comfortable margins, ranging from 77-44 for articles funding legal services, a health officer and the pensions and insurances budget to 67-54 for the Police Department budget.
Articles funding town boards, town clerk/elections, code enforcement and planning, debt service and animal control passed by smaller margins.
Tuesday’s referendum was necessitated by action taken in June, when voters rejected nine of the 29 funding articles as originally presented to them for approval.
The total dollar value of the nine rejected articles amounted to nearly half of the town’s $2.4 million budget.
The council and the Budget Committee, which hadn’t seen eye to eye in the recommendations they made on the budget as presented in June referendum, sat down earlier in July and reached a consensus on reductions in the portion of the failed budget.
With the full budget for the current fiscal year finally approved, its effect on property taxes will result in a projected increase of about $81 per $100,000 of assessed property value.
Had the full budget passed as presented in June, property taxes would have been projected to increase by about $146 per $100,000 of assessed property value.
The total amount of money earmarked for running municipal departments for the current fiscal year is about $83,000 less than last year.
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