CARIBOU, Maine — The 2016 municipal budget was passed last week, eliciting diverse opinions from the people of Caribou. The $8,814,122 spending target for next year is 0.8 percent, or $72,204, lower than 2015’s budget.
According to data published on Caribou’s website, the bulk of the budget is dedicated to Fire and Ambulance, Public Works, and the Police Department, which are respectively acquiring 26.06 percent, 21.52 percent, and 16.16 percent of the general fund. Collectively, these three departments will receive 63.78 percent of the municipal outlay.
City Councilor Joan Theriault stresses that this is only the the municipal portion of the budget, and that the Aroostook County and RSU 39 budgets could still impact the mill rate.
“We already know that the County’s budget has increased,” said Theriault, “and if the school department has an increase this year as it has in the past, and if the voters pass that budget next June, then there will most likely be an increase in the mill rate for 2016, regardless of how hard the municipal side worked to hold any tax increases in check.”
Paul Camping, Secession Committee chairman and spokesperson, is relieved that the mill rate did not rise, but believes that it could be even lower.
“What we have is an expense budget with no mill rate increase in it,” Camping said. “However, people had difficulty paying taxes in 2012. They went up in 2013 and people are still suffering. We called for them to use the $3.4 million (reimbursed by the Maine Public Employee Retirement System) as money that could be put in the budget so we could get a mill rate decrease this year. We presented that proposal back in June and they declined to follow up the request, and people in the rural community are still suffering.”
Camping and his group believe that seceding from Caribou would allow the newly formed town of Lyndon to operate under a dramatically lower mill rate.
“One of the important considerations of our secession report is that we believe we can provide all the basic services that people need for a mill rate of 15.9 instead of what we are now paying,” said Camping. “The way we do it is by looking for ways to save money in every department.”
Camping said that the proposed town meeting form of government in Lyndon would give citizens complete control of all spending decisions.
“Hypothetically,” continued Camping, “if Lyndon became a town and somebody wanted to establish the Lyndon Public Library and the cost was going to be $250,000, then the budget committee would make a recommendation against it but the citizens could vote on it knowing full well that if they approved it they would be increasing their taxes. That’s a powerful tool.”
Caribou’s public library, which did not receive a second full-time position, will get 2.49 percent of the budget, but with an increase of $5,979 over 2015.
Library Board member Gail Hagelstein presented a petition to add the second position, which received roughly 300 signatures in a week and a half, during City Council’s final budget meeting. Despite this, councilors chose not to fund an additional employee.
Camping did not think it was a good idea to fund the second position, but adds that council “could have funded it by making cuts in other departments and still held the line on the expense budget.”
“We have advocated for a long time that a lot of money is spent on recreation,” said Camping. “We said, many years ago, that it would not be a bad idea to charge a modest fee for the people who use the recreation department. When I go to the landfill, someone takes my permit number and puts it on a log sheet. It was five dollars for a permit when I first started using the landfill, and it’s a fee I don’t mind paying, because I believe user fees are important. The library could utilize this to their advantage, which would take pressure off the taxpayer.”
Councilor Theriault also made it clear that the library will not be closing.
“They may have to adjust the hours of operation here and there, but it is not essential that we fill the requested position of a librarian at this time, although I certainly would like to be able to fill that in the future. The library has come a long way and is an asset to Caribou. The library is not closing, it may have to shorten its day from time to time, but Caribou will still have its library.”
Monica Sprague, who operates a business out of her home on the Albair Road, agreed with the council’s decision not to hire the second librarian, but does not approve of next year’s budget.
“I’m glad it didn’t go through because you don’t need a second librarian,” said Sprague. “We already have a part-time person. If you have one person working full-time and the other working part-time, then I believe that is more more than enough to take care of everything. I really believe that the part-timers who fill in are more than enough to help put books away.”
Sprague, like others who live on the outskirts of Caribou, is struggling to pay for her home due to recent tax increases.
“I can’t pay all my bills,” said Sprague. “That’s the toughest thing I have to go through. I have to pick and choose which bills to pay at the end of the month and decide which things to keep turned on.”
Sprague believes that, since the population of Caribou is decreasing, taxes should be decreasing as well.
“At this point, the city is down by about four police officers,” said Sprague. “I think 15 police officers for 8,000 people is fine when we had less than that for 12,000 people. The roads are not done like they should be; our back roads don’t get well cared for and we need repairs, so it doesn’t make sense to spend more for an extra person in the library. I’d rather have the holes in our roads repaired.
“I feel that the focus should be on allowing people to live, not just paycheck to paycheck. The whole picture needs to be looked at. How many teachers and town employees did we have back when our population was 12,000? We’ve lost 4,000 people. We can downsize somewhere,” she said.
Vernal Greenier is another Caribou citizen who supports secession and believes the recent budget isn’t helping the problems faced by rural citizens.
“It’s not getting rid of anything,” said Greenier. “I sold my house because of what’s going on. I just ignore it now. You fight and you fight and don’t make any headway. They’re going to do what they want to. It’s ridiculous and it’s not fair to the people who do pay taxes. I’m one of them.”
Greenier says that the best solution would be to “get some industry in the city to help out the little guy.”
Sprague also believes the introduction of new businesses would be a great way to lower taxes.
“I’d like to see if we can attract some new businesses to town,” explained Sprague. “We have so many empty buildings for rent. We could attract clothing stores and other businesses. Millers was a great store, but now people go to towns like Presque Isle when they want to buy anything big. We have that big parking lot where Save A Lot is, you could have a nice little mini mall there.”
Both Sprague and Camping are unhappy with Caribou’s decision to create its own ambulance service as opposed to utilizing an existing service for their needs.
“We could’ve changed over to Crown Ambulance without paying hundreds of thousands of dollars,” says Sprague. “Crown was willing to do it for just $100,000.”
“We were looking to provide ambulance service to Lyndon via Crown,” said Camping, “meaning the town would not have to buy an ambulance, hire paramedics, or build a garage. There would be no insurance payments or equipment costs either. All we would have to do is pay the fee.
“Caribou, on the other hand, said that they had a better idea. They said ‘We’re going to have a fleet of four or five ambulances and hire paramedics who are also firefighters and this is going to make us money,’ but if you look at the budget this year it shows that their expenses exceeded their income by almost $270,000. That’s what we are paying to have an ambulance service in Caribou.”
Councilor Theriault further elaborated on the reasons why Caribou decided to opt out of utilizing Presque Isle’s emergency services.
“A couple of years ago,” explained Theriault, “City Officials and private citizens, one of whom was Paul Camping, formed an ambulance study committee and met with officials from Presque Isle to determine if it would be cost effective to have Crown provide Caribou’s ambulance service. The conclusion was that it would not be. In fact, during the process, I had many people let me know of their displeasure to that possibility. I remember one Thursday’s on Sweden in particular when a woman came up to my table, sat down in the chair next to me, and said ‘Don’t you dare send our ambulance to Presque Isle! Don’t you dare!’”
