Representatives of Regional School Unit 1 and its five communities met Thursday afternoon to iron out details of a new committee that will meet during the summer to discuss a potential new costsharing formula for the district.

The new committee, to include two members of each community as well as RSU 1 board chairman Tim Harkins and Superintendent Patrick Manual, is slated to meet at least twice a month, with the goal of returning to the school board by early September with a recommendation on a new funding formula that “makes sense and is palatable for all the communities,” Harkins said.

That timeline, he said, would allow any proposed formula changes to go to referendum at the November general election.

While the board’s decision on cost-sharing is final for 2012-13, Harkins said he hopes the committee will “find a cost-sharing method that is more based on hard data and less on sort of emotion (and) politics.”

To arrive at that formula, the group discussed consulting with professionals to examine financial data and other cost-sharing scenarios in the state.

Abbe Yacoben, chairwoman of the West Bath Board of Selectmen, told the group Thursday that “the historical piece” must also be included.

During the past four years, West Bath paid approximately $1.9 million more to RSU 1 than it would have had the district followed the costsharing formula that an April legal opinion deemed correct, Yacoben said Thursday evening.

That figure, she said, “is huge. In rough numbers, we’re talking about $435,000 every year for a town with a valuation of approximately $350 million. That’s 1.2531 mils a year. It’s significant.”

While West Bath hopes the committee can come up with a fair cost-sharing formula for 2014 and beyond, Yacoben said town officials hope to recoup the $1.9 million the town overpaid the RSU during the last few years.

“We understand that it wouldn’t happen all at once, and we absolutely wouldn’t expect something like that,” she said. “But we’re hoping we can incorporate that while talking about the funding formula for the future.”

“We absolutely want things to be equitable — we’re absolutely committed to this subcommittee” Yacoben told the group on Thursday. “I know this is a tough subject, but the past has to come to be part of the conversation. West Bath is very upset about the application of the formula. We understand this is a touchy subject and we don’t want to make it emotional … but we need to be made whole.”

Woolwich Selectman Lloyd Coombs said his community is concerned that the “onethird” formula is partly based on valuation — “just what someone feels something is worth” — when another factor, student enrollment, is “a real number.”

“Woolwich wants it to be equitable,” he said. “That’s easy to say — very difficult to achieve.”

Phippsburg Selectman Gary Read said Phippsburg “took a big hit,” as a result of cost-sharing changes in the 2012-13 budget made to comply with the April legal opinion, and had to manipulate its budget to keep the property tax rate down.

Selectwoman Sukey Heard from Arrowsic said that town saw a 16 percent increase over last year’s costs, but that she won’t know how community members feel about the $69,000 increase until next week’s annual town meeting.

Still, she said, “We’re willing to work with you guys on how it needs to happen.”

Bath City Council chairman David Sinclair said city residents remain concerned about basing the new formula on “validatable metrics,” but he pointed out, “I think the city of Bath has been clear about our position relative to the recent change (in the costsharing formula). We went to pains of writing a letter on the topic.”

Of Yacoben’s concerns about the past cost-sharing, Sinclair said he sympathizes with West Bath, but noted, “I hope that the emotion about that doesn’t shape our vision going forward.”

Yacoben responded, “For us, it’s about $435,000 a year — which is over one mil. For me, it’s hearing from folks on … fixed incomes. We absorbed this hit. We were directed to pay it, we had to pay it, we paid it and so now we’d like some relief.”

While each community will be sending a primary representative and an alternate — who may also participate in all meetings — each will only have one vote if and when a vote is taken.

“My intent is to minimize the amount of issues we’re voting on,” Harkins said. “The goal is to try to reach consensus.”

Who will represent each community will be decided by its members, and those present on Thursday were charged with contacting Harkins by Wednesday with names, proposed meeting times and potential agenda items.

One item the committee is expected to address at its first meeting is a presentation by RSU 1 Finance Director Ruth Moore on LD 910, the legislation that created RSU 1, and other cost-sharing agreements.

bbrogan@timesrecord.com

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