Windham town officials are asking unions representing town employees to consider a wage freeze as they try to close a gap of roughly $1.5 million in the next budget.

Town Manager Tony Plante has approached each of the three unions, representing police officers, paramedics, and public works employees, respectively, to gauge their willingness to forgo contractual annual pay increases in light of the economic downturn in Windham and elsewhere. The wage freeze, which is already figured into the budget proposal, would save about $400,000, he said.

“While we do not yet have firm agreements in hand yet, we do have some agreement in principle and understanding that the current economic situation calls for these kinds of measures to preserve the services and the town’s capacity to deliver them as much as possible,” Plante wrote in his Feb. 20 memo to the council.

The town faces with each union a slightly different situation. In December, the Town Council approved a three-year contract with the Gorham-Windham Professional Firefighters Assocition/I.A.F.F. Local 4095 that includes annual pay increases of 2.5 percent. The contract with the patrolman’s union expires June 30, and the town is currently renegotiating with the public works union.

Membership of each union would have to approve a wage freeze, either by approving a new contract that includes the wage freeze, as in the case of the unions now in negotiations, or by forgoing the wage increases already in the approved contract.

Alan Churchill of Teamsters Local 340 in South Portland, which represents the public works employees, said a union may agree to a wage freeze if it is seen as in the best interest of both the town and the employees. It also helps if the employees trust the town management enough to know that such an action is really necessary, he said.

“We certainly recognize that we are in extraordinary times, and we are sensitive to employer needs,” said Churchill, who said negotiations would continue this week. “We recognize there is a problem, and it may help us not have a layoff.”

Plante has included the wage freeze in his budget proposal, which still requires another $218,000 in cuts to reach the council’s goal of no property tax increase. The Town Council will in the next couple of months decide on how to bridge the last part of that gap – cuts that are likely to include town personnel and services.

At a time when everybody is feeling the pinch, Chairwoman Carol Waig said it is only fair that the burden be spread evenly along all town departments, and include both union and nonunion employees.

“All employee groups will need to share the brunt of cuts, if any, that may or may not happen,” said Waig. “This should include the union employees as well to make it fair across the board. It is very easy to just cut the nonunion staff as they have no union to protect them … but that is not the fair way to go about business.”