Portland voters approved the school district’s $102.8 million school budget Tuesday night, with fewer than 1,000 of the city’s roughly 54,000 registered voters casting ballots.

The vote was 653 for the budget, 317 against. The 970 voters represent less then 2 percent of those registered in Portland.

The budget, a 1.2 percent increase over the previous school budget, has been described as “modest and austere” by school Superintendent Emmanuel Caulk. It increases the school portion of Portland’s tax rate by 23 cents per $1,000 of assessed property value, adding $46 to the annual tax bill for a $200,000 home.

The budget makes some presumptions about the state budget being debated in Augusta.

Under Gov. Paul LePage’s proposed state budget, Portland’s state education funding decreases $920,000, or 6.5 percent. The district also is adjusting for the added cost of funding teachers’ retirement, a change made two years ago by the LePage administration.

The budget also eliminates $250,000 in direct payments to charter schools that enroll Portland students. LePage signed a bill last week spreading charter school costs across all districts instead of directly billing them to charter school students’ home districts.

The budget includes money for a 1.6 percent increase in staffing, for a student population that increased about 1 percent.

The budget adds 17 additional locally funded staff positions, including two previously grant-funded teachers at East End Elementary School, a community engagement coordinator position, and 14 positions that were added since the last budget, bringing the total staff to 1,101 positions. The district also has 93 grant-funded positions.

Enrollment for 2014 was 7,034 students, up 56 students from 2013.

Voter turnout for school budget referendums has been lower than for general elections. Last May, 1,492 or 2.9 percent of the city’s registered voters cast ballots in the school budget referendum.

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