MACHIAS — Nine residents and four Select Board members have unanimously approved using $69,000 from the town’s unassigned fund balance to cover budget overruns in the Fire Department and Police Department.
The vote came during a brief special town meeting last week, where Town Manager Sarah Craighead Dedmon cited equipment failures and a new payment system for Fire Department volunteers as reasons for the $34,000 overrun.
For the Police Department, an administrative error failed to account for the purchase of a cruiser in July 2025, leading to a $35,000 overrun. Finance staff members recently discovered the omission that left Chief Keith Mercier without accurate spending data.
To avoid this in the future, voters at the June 23 annual town meeting approved a warrant article allowing the Select Board in the new fiscal year to transfer up to 10 percent of unspent balances between budget accounts, a practice recommended by the Maine Municipal Association.
There was some discussion around a question raised by Machias resident Richard Larson, who asked the board whether it was confident in the amount of money in the undesignated fund balance, or surplus.
Finance Director Nicholas McDonald estimates a little more than $2 million to be in the fund, even after accounting for the $300,000 in total transfers from the account approved at the annual town meeting, Craighead Dedmon said by telephone Friday.
She added that the town is waiting for its 2024 financial audit to come back before it pays off a $314,152 loan it borrowed to help cover the Washington County 2025 budget shortfall.
“I told Mr. Larson that I’m quite confident, as long as we get the police chief and fire chief accurate baseline numbers, they can manage a budget,” Craighead Dedmon said.
