WOOLWICH — Woolwich selectmen on Monday told the Regional School Union 1 board of directors that the 9.92 percent increase in their town’s share of the district’s budget results from faulty calculations that they hope the board — and Maine Revenue Services — will help them correct
The proposed $26 million RSU 1 budget for fiscal year 2013 presented Monday by Superintendent Patrick Manuel calls for other communities in the district to see far lower increases, ranging from 0.77 percent to 5.4 percent, or in the case of Phippsburg, a reduction of 1.71 percent.
LD 910, the unique legislation that created RSU 1, factors enrollment, census and property valuation when figuring a community’s share of the budget, and Woolwich’s 2011 valuation — which RSU 1 used to calculate its 2012-13 budget — increased by approximately $15 million, according to David King, chairman of the Woolwich Board of Selectmen.
However, King said the valuation decreased by about $14 million the next year.
Both changes, King said, were “so unusual.” Selectmen didn’t realize they had occurred until recently — far too late for them to appeal the valuations, he said.
“We should have caught it,” he said. “There’s nobody to blame except the Board of Selectmen. But the consequences didn’t come up until (now).”
The 2011 valuation is based on 2009 figures, and King said he’s not sure how the town picked up $15 million in new valuation that year.
“In all the years I’ve been a selectman here, even back when Goose Cove was being built and Orchard Shores, we picked up a little less than $3 million ( in valuation),” he said. “We’re a bedroom community. We have a very small commercial district downtown, and Route 1 is a closed access road. We’re never going to have any great amount of commerce district in this town.”
King said selectmen have invited a representative of Maine Revenue Services to meet with them on Monday afternoon to try to figure out how the sudden increase — and then decrease — occurred, especially when previous valuations had not risen more than $3 million a year.
On Monday, King told RSU 1 board members, “I’m in hopes we can convince you folks to use that valuation and not this incorrect one.”
RSU 1 board chairman Timothy Harkins said, “ Something seems to be out of whack here, especially with Woolwich … it’s confusing to us as well. Hopefully, we can get to the bottom of it.”
On Wednesday, Manuel said he awaits a return phone call from Deputy Commissioner Jim Rier of the Maine Department of Education.
He said he assumed that any potential adjustment to the cost-sharing breakdown would come from the Maine Department of Education, which dictates the local share for each community.
bbrogan@timesrecord.com