Wiscasset schools will have a police officer for the next school year. The decision did not come easily for residents at town meeting on May 31. It took them three votes to settle on a police department budget with the school resource officer in it.

It took just one vote of 123-14 to agree to dip into the town’s reserve fund for $1.25 million to offset taxes. The move will pare a projected 27 percent tax hike to less than 10 percent. The numbers figure in a school budget that voters will consider at the polls on June 10.

“I hate doing this ... but we really kind of have to,” resident Dick Grondin said in support of tapping the reserve money.

The first vote regarding the resource officer ended in an 83-83 tie on the budget that Police Chief Troy Cline and Wiscasset selectmen proposed, with the position in it. The budget committee favored a budget without the added officer. A vote on the budget committee version lost, 69-98.

The third and last vote ran 91-76, in favor of the budget with the resource officer.

“I'm very happy,” Cline said in an interview afterward. He said he knew getting the job funded would be a challenge; voters' decision represents forward thinking, he said.

Another contended item Saturday was whether to keep the town planner full-time or drop the job to part-time and save about $26,000. A year ago, the planning budget that included the position lost in a budget vote at the polls, then passed in a close revote.

Budget committee member Norm Guidoboni said dropping the position to 20 hours this year would be a compromise over eliminating the position altogether, as the panel proposed last year.

Proponents of keeping a full-time planner praised the work of Town Planner Misty Parker, and argued the town has a good process for prospective businesses to follow.

Trying to attract businesses to Wiscasset, to grow the tax base, is a full-time job, Selectmen's Chairman Ed Polewarczyk said. “This is the solution to try to reduce our taxes in the future.”

Voters passed the planning budget with the full-time position intact, 138-33.

In other decisions, residents rejected a proposed five-hour hike in an administrative assistant’s hours; passed a $10,630 shellfish conservation budget that keeps enforcement and seed clam spending intact; and agreed to repair the municipal building roof for $40,000.