Lisbon’s clerk rules petition insufficient

LISBON

On the advice of an attorney, Lisbon’s town clerk has deemed a special town meeting petition insufficient. It was submitted Tuesday by a group of citizens for the purpose of letting voters reconsider the 2015-16 school budget adopted by the town council on May 19.

The council made amendments to the school committee’s proposed budget on May 19, which reduced the $15,501,264 spending plan down to $15,101,654, which includes $168,672 in adult education costs, according to Superintendent Richard Green.

The petition sought to provide an opportunity to call a town meeting and let taxpayers vote on the school budget, Kolbe said. People can vote down the school budget adopted by the town council on May 19 at the June 9 budget validation referendum. However, the ballot question is not legally binding asking if those voters marking “no” in favor of the school budget did so because it is too high or too low.

The clerk’s letter of certificate, signed Wednesday by Town Clerk Twila Lycette, certifies the petition as being insufficient. It states in part that with the budget validation referendum scheduled for June 9, “The petition does not comply with the charter requirement that special town meeting petitions must be filed within 15 days after the budget being questioned becomes legally adopted.”

The letter further states that under Maine law and the charter, “the council is the legislative body responsible for adoption of the school budget … and that the school budget approved by the council is submitted to referendum for validation in accordance with Maine law. A special town meeting to reconsider a school budget approved by the council and by the voters in a secret ballot validation referendum would not be consistent with the statutory and charter requirements for adoption of school budgets.”

The majority of the reduction resulted from the council limiting the school department’s planned use of bond proceeds from the gym project and use of capital reserve revenue.

The initial proposed spending plan would have resulted in no additional request in local taxes from the current fiscal year. The council-revised spending plan results in an estimated $43,734 reduction in local taxes, Green said. It now goes to a budget validation referendum on June 9.

In January, the town council issued a directive to the town manager to find $ 300,000 in municipal spending cuts and to the Lisbon School Department to take $600,000 from additional local funding — money spent above and beyond the state’s Essential Programs and Services funding model. The council’s goal was not to have a flat tax rate but a decrease in taxes.

Many students, parents and some teachers within the school department spoke in favor of the school’s proposed budget and urged the council not to make the additional cuts the council planned to propose.

Kasie Kolbe, the mother of six, was vocal at that meeting. She heads up the nine-member petitioners’ committee and said the committee on Tuesday submitted a petition with 718 signatures. Only 414 signatures were required.

“Throughout this entire process, the community has come out and said we don’t support this,” Kolbe said, referring to the additional cuts the council made. “I mean, we’re down on our knees at this point. We’re not budging anymore.”

With the exception of councilors Mark Lunt and Gregg Garrison, who voted against the council’s budget amendments on May 19, “I don’t trust them,” Kolbe said of the council, to honor that feedback should the budget fail.

Kolbe said Thursday that the petitioners’ committee hasn’t had a chance to discuss the “insufficient” finding yet. Personally, she wasn’t surprised about the determination. The 718 signatures the committee gathered Sunday and Monday she said “I think speaks volumes for the amount of time we had to get signatures, and how many people are ready to back us up.”

She believes the council will continue to do what it wants and said, “It doesn’t matter how loud you yell or scream, they’re going to turn a deaf ear to it.”

“Right now we’re just trying to see what our options are, because the charter is so vague,” she said. “There are so many gray areas. It doesn’t specify which budget, it just says budget, so at this point we’re seeing what our avenues of approach are going to be.”

One option, for example, is to have the council review the clerk’s certificate. She said the committee should have a plan of action by Tuesday.

Kolbe and another committee member sat at Food City on Monday from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. and gathered 290 signatures — mostly from retired and elderly people.

“ They asked, ‘ Is this going to hurt the kids?’” Kolbe said, “ and we explained the whole process and they signed it.” She noted it’s not just parents of students signing the petition and to get so many signatures in one day, “I think that makes a very large statement.”

The special town meeting petition process has never been undertaken in town since the charter was adopted. While she knew the town attorney questioned whether a special town meeting can be called to reconsider the school budget before a school budget is approved by voters June 9, Kolbe argued Tuesday a budget was adopted by the council May 19.

Following that May 19 council meeting, the school committee has met to discuss where it can find the additional $399,000 in cuts and will continue to have those conversations, Green said. However, those decisions don’t need to be made before the June 9 budget validation referendum.

Green said he’s listened to and believes the public is opposed to the additional cuts in revenue. With submission of the petition, school officials will wait to see how things pan out.

When and if a petition is determined to be sufficient, the council must set a date for a special town meeting to be held not later than 15 days after the determination. Budget adoption at the special town meeting requires a majority vote in favor of the budget article; and at least 250 votes cast for or against the budget article.

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