On a directive that came out of a budget workshop April 4, Wiscasset Town Manager Marian Anderson will be looking into what it would cost to farm out ambulance service.

On Tuesday, April 7, selectmen gave Anderson the go-ahead to seek proposals from private agencies. No decisions have been made to make a change, Anderson said. “This is just gathering information.”

The idea of going private has been bandied before, but as Selectmen’s Chairman Pam Dunning pointed out Saturday, that and other ideas for changes in town services keep resurfacing, but go nowhere.

“The town needs to stop having the same conversation every year,” Dunning said.

Selectmen and the budget committee also briefly discussed whether to explore alternatives for police services and recreation; but neither idea led to a directive for Anderson. The one that did, regarding ambulance service, came after the two panels rejected the idea of a town straw vote on privatizing the service. Participants said the timing wouldn’t work, since voters may also be asked to replace one of Wiscasset Ambulance Service’s ambulances for $170,000.

The privatization idea needs to be resolved before the selectmen decide whether or not to put the new ambulance in the budget proposal, Dunning said.

“If the ambulance department may or may not be here in a year or two, I’m not going to vote for an ambulance,” she said. “That’s irresponsible.”

No one took issue with the ambulance department’s service; the quality of service would go down with privatization, Selectman Tim Merry said. But some budget committee members asked why the town is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars a year on a service that some contractors are willing to give towns for free.

Some also called for Edgecomb, Alna and Westport Island to each start paying Wiscasset more for ambulance service. Each contributes $3,000, town officials said.

In 2014, about 600 of the ambulance service’s 800-plus calls for service came from Wiscasset; 144 from Edgecomb; Westport Island, 40; and Alna, 44, the service’s director Roland Abbott said.

Some participants said Wiscasset residents may want to keep funding the service to keep it part of the town.

“What’s your heart attack or your stroke worth to you, if it’s your mom,” Dunning asked.

Anderson said senior citizens she has spoken with like seeing a familiar face when an ambulance comes.

“There is a value that you can’t measure to having your local service,” Anderson said.

The question of privatization is not the only potential obstacle to a new ambulance. The buy is one of several proposed, big-ticket capital improvements that also include a police cruiser replacement and sidewalk work. Anderson will prioritize the items for selectmen.

The board may not end up agreeing with those priorities, but the list will help selectmen in their work, Dunning said.

The board and the budget committee agreed Saturday that the capital items that make the final cut will then face separate town votes to approve spending. Bundling them would risk them all being rejected if voters opposed part of the package, participants said.

Separate vote on school officer

One of Saturday’s longest discussions centered on funding for the Wiscasset Police Department’s school resource officer’s job that voters created in 2014. Budget committee member Vince Thibeault, who has two teens at Wiscasset High School, questioned whether the position should stay.

“It doesn’t sound to me like things are really getting better,” Thibeault said.

“I would respectfully disagree,” Police Chief Troy Cline said. Officer Perry Hatch has made a huge impact, he said. A recent drug arrest of a teen showed the cooperation now happening among parents, school staff and law enforcement, Cline said.

The job’s funding will be a separate question for voters, not rolled into the police department’s budget proposal as it was last year, selectmen said. It took multiple votes to pass the police budget at town meeting.

Selectmen also discussed having the resource officer question only reflect funding for the approximately three-quarters of the job that is spent working in the schools. The rest of the time, Hatch is on patrol as other officers are.

The patrol portion of the job would be funded under the vote for the police budget, selectmen said. The total yearly cost for the position was projected at $46,990.

In an interview outside the workshop, Cline said he understood the thought process for breaking the school officer’s position out for voters to consider separately.

“It doesn’t bother me that it’s a separate warrant article. I would like to think that the town is going to vote to keep that officer,” he said.

Also Saturday, budget committee member Bob Blagden praised Anderson’s work on the budget draft, her first as town manager. But he said he’s seeing the same over-funding across departments as he always does, which he said results in more taxes being raised, then going unspent and winding up in the town’s fund balance. Tighter budgeting would avoid that, he said.

“That would be my goal ... to not raise a bunch of extra money,” Blagden said.