WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?

According to google, these are the mil rates and population for towns in Androscoggin County.  What should stand out to everyone is the major discrepancy between the mil rates and the populations.

TOWNS                     MIL RATE                 POPULATION

Auburn                      23.68                         22,948 

Sabattus                    17.75                         5,015

Lisbon                       24.84                         8,846

Lewiston                   28.67                         36,140

Durham                    18.85                         3,940

Wales                         14.85                         1,634

Greene                      17.80                         4,373

Poland                       14.74                         5,544

Minot                         15.85                         2,596

Livermore Falls       21.60                         3,115

Turner                       17.05                         5,765

As you can see Lisbon has moved into second place in the county as far as the mil rate goes surpassing Auburn.  These figures for population are from 2016.  The reason for the discrepancy is because our Town Manager, Diane Barnes, compares populations when determining salaries instead of the tax base for the towns.  As everyone knows Auburn has many more commercial businesses than Lisbon and yet our mil rate is higher.

There is no way that the salaries of Department Heads in Lisbon should be as high as they are starting out.  We just do not have the tax base to support such high salaries and the Town Manager knew this from the start but used population to establish salaries without comparing tax bases and our Town Council believes everything the Town Manager says as gospel.

The Town Council needs to delay voting on spending issues until the Council can do adequate investigations.  The Town Council needs to cut spending to include the Town Manager’s salary.  The Department Heads are receiving between $1,200.00 and $1,800.00 annually and taxpayers in Lisbon cannot afford these increases.  There is no way to reduce Department Heads salaries because the Town Manager, Diane Barnes has committed the taxpayers into paying these outrageous salaries.

Taxpayers and the Town Council have to pay more attention to the spending habits of the Town Manager and her Department Heads.  We have to bring down our mil rate so that it is more in line with our population and other towns in the county.

Let’s put a halt to excessive spending and start comparing apple to apples instead of apples to oranges.

Larry Fillmore