The Newcastle Board of Selectmen and Finance Committee met Feb. 6 to hear from a couple of nonprofits seeking funds in this year’s budget, as well as the Fire Department. The selectmen expected to hear from CLC Ambulance as well, but the agency did not appear, likely because they did not receive the request, Town Administrator Jon Duke said.

The first nonprofit to appear, Coastal Kids, asked for $2,000, $500 more than budgeted last year. The Newcastle preschool works with special needs children as well as those developing normally. Coastal Kids had recently been accredited under the National Association for the Education of Young Children, the only preschool in Lincoln County to have that designation. The preschool currently has 15 children from Newcastle in its program.

Midcoast Conservancy is seeking $3,000 this year to help with its water quality program and its youth employment project, working with local homes and businesses that have minor problems with erosion, within the Sheepscot River and Damariscotta Lake watersheds. The nonprofit often hires youth from Lincoln Academy for the program. This year, the conservancy also has a grant from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection to work with people facing bigger problems with water quality and erosion on the Damariscotta Lake watershed, a small portion of which is in the North Newcastle area.

The conservancy’s request was $2,000 higher than last year, in part because the mission of the program was expanding to the Sheepscot River watershed.

Fire Chief Clayton Huntley explained the department’s budget. He said some line items, including maintenance, increased. The town should no longer be doing its own maintenance for legal reasons, Huntley said. He pointed out a Wiscasset case in which a volunteer fire truck driver had been held personally liable after a tire came off and damaged another vehicle. Some line items decreased, including the fire department’s liability insurance costs, because the department is having routine maintenance done by outside firms. In the end, it was nearly a wash, with the fire department seeking only $500 above last year’s budget, Huntley said.