Long-Smith Senate primary results close
The administration, board and voters of School Administrative District 1 are looking to find savings for a new budget, while two Republican contenders for a state Senate seat wait to find out who won.
As of Tuesday morning, a week after the June 16 primary elections, there still was not a clear winner in the Maine Senate District 2 Republican primary between Ricky Long, a state representative and logger from Sherman, and Emily Smith, a Presque Isle city councilor and farmer.
With 42 of 47 precincts reporting to the Bangor Daily News, Long was attributed 50.66 percent of the votes and Smith 49.34 percent. They had until the end 5 p.m.Tuesday, June 21, 2016 to request a recount and the Maine Secretary of State has until 20 days following the election to release full results.
The winner of that primary will go on to face Democratic candidate Michael Carpenter of Houlton, to replace Republican Mike Willette of Presque Isle in representing a district of northern Penobscot and southern and central Aroostook counties.
On the school budget front, leaders and stakeholders within SAD1 will have to come to agreements on a new budget, to avoid the 9 percent local property tax increases that district voters rejected, with 63.5 percent voting no. A separate bond question for district voters was approved, allowing a $500,000 asbestos abatement project to begin at the Presque Isle High School.
Ahead of a special board meeting June 23, SAD 1 Superintendent Brian Carpenter released a list of “potential ideas” that the board could decide to adopt and to present voters with a revised budget.
One idea is eliminating the move to all-day kindergarten, which would reduce the budget by $362,598, though not necessarily yield a lot of savings. The all-day kindergarten plan involved drawing $175,000 from the district’s fund balance, and the superintendent suggests that at least $150,000 of that should be put back in the fund, which would “lessen the savings to taxes,” Carpenter wrote.
Other areas of the budget that Carpenter listed include deferring maintenance at the Mapleton Elementary School boiler (saving $38,000) and reducing contracted services, such as with the Central Aroostook Council on Education (saving a net of $36,200).
The board could also consider spending less on sports. Carpenter’s budget outline mentions that $32,000 could be saved by postponing renovation of the Dyer Field and “hope for external funding.” The district could also end its agreement with Aroostook Youth Basketball (saving $2,000) and limit the hockey team to one hour of ice time for each practice (saving $3,360), he wrote.
With all of those items together (accounting for the fund balance return), the budget’s spending would increase by 2.8 percent overall, although it’s not clear what the local property tax increase would be. The budget voters rejected would have increased overall spending by 4 percent and require property tax assessments to increase by 9 percent.
The SAD 1 board is having a special meeting for the budget on Thursday, June 23, at 5:30 p.m. in the Presque Isle Middle School Auditorium
Left to secure their next budget are the communities of MSAD 45, Washburn, Perham and Wade who will vote Wednesday, June 22 at 7 p.m. on a budget that would come with a rise in the district’s mill rate from 8.23 to 8.3.
Earlier this month Easton voters approved a school budget that raised their tax assessments by 0.2 percent, while voters in SAD 42 of Blaine, Bridgewater and Mars Hill, and voters in SAD 32, serving greater Ashland, approved budgets that come with no tax increases.
