At least six Maine school districts rejected school budget proposals during Tuesday’s mostly low-turnout election, while several others survived narrow votes.

In some districts, individual towns said no to the budgets even as they passed in overall vote totals, and in others, budgets that were closely watched passed easily.

Steven Bailey, executive director of the Maine School Management Association, said he expected this to be a challenging budget year, so he was pleasantly surprised by how many budgets did ultimately pass. He said districts were still figuring out how to adjust after the end of federal pandemic funds, and had to contend with unavoidable increases like paid family medical leave premiums and raises to teacher salaries required by collective bargaining agreements.

“People were very aware of any impact on taxes that increased budgets might have, so they were being quite cautious,” he said.

The districts where budgets failed were: RSU 21 in York County, Gray-New Gloucester, Lisbon, RSU 4 in Androscoggin County, MSAD 58 in Franklin County and RSU 87 in southern Penobscot County.

This year’s trend mostly mirrored last June, when at least five districts rejected budget proposals.

Bailey said across the state, active anti-budget campaigns this year focused on issues like school closures, discontentment from individual towns within a larger districts, and voters unhappy with school districts that have not banned transgender athletes from participating in high school.

In communities where budgets were rejected, the spending plan will go back to the school board to be reworked, and voters will get to weigh in again at an upcoming second referendum vote.

Many communities across the state also elected new school board members, and a long-fought Cape Elizabeth school construction bond was approved after being twice-rejected in past votes. The $86.5 million project received support by a 300-vote margin.

REJECTIONS

In RSU 21 in York County, Kennebunk, Kennebunkport and Arundel all rejected the proposed $62.6 million budget, which represented a 5.5% increase over the current year’s spending plan. About 55% of voters across all three communities voted “no.”

A spokesperson for the district pointed to a June 2 statement from Board Chair Matt Stratford, who said the increase was tied to essential, non-negotiable costs. He encouraged voters to support the budget but also acknowledged community hesitations.

“I recognize the conversation being had by those in the community who oppose budget is not new, and that conversation is rooted with frustrations of the growth of our system administration costs over the past few years,” Stratford said. He also responded specifically to concerns that the budget included funds for the 8 ½-month severance package for outgoing Superintendent Terri Cooper, who resigned in March. He said that package is being covered with contingency funds from the current budget, and the board did not want to raise any new taxes for that expense.

In the combined Gray-New Gloucester School District, voters rejected the proposed $35.4 million budget by just 19 votes. The two communities were split on support: Gray rejected the budget, with 644 voting in favor and 805 against, while 567 residents in New Gloucester supported the budget and 425 voted against it.

Voters in Lisbon overwhelmingly rejected the town’s proposed $21.2 million budget, a reaction to an 8% increase in property taxes that voters said was too much of a strain on homeowners. Almost 70% of voters said no to the spending plan, which comes as the town struggles to deal with a financial hole caused by an accounting error in the municipal budget last year.

“Why in the hell should I be paying school tax when I don’t have students in school?” voter Deb Duhamel said in an interview at the polls. “I don’t agree with this at all. They need to do something about this. People are losing their homes.”

RSU 4, which includes Wales, Sabattus and Litchfield, also rejected its budget, but by just 16 votes. That comes just two years after taking four referendums and a $750,000 reduction in cost to get its school budget passed.

MSAD 58, the district that includes Avon, Kingfield, Phillips and Strong, rejected its school budget 198-169. And in rural RSU 87, made up of the towns of Levant and Carmel, 162 people, or 62% of those who turned out, voted “no” on the budget.

MOST BUDGETS PASS

In Gorham, the $57.5 million school district budget passed by about 200 votes despite a coordinated opposition campaign. Gorham resident Ben Tuttle, founder of the group Gorham Watchdogs, created a social media blitz and posted signs around town urging a “no” vote with messages like “raise test scores, not taxes.”

Two years ago Gorham took three separate votes to approve a budget, and last year the referendum was approved by just four votes, which led to a recount where it ultimately prevailed by just two. Turnout in Gorham this year was much higher than most communities in the region at 28.3%. Superintendent Heather Perry thanked every resident who got out to the polls this week.

“The annual school budget validation referendum is always such a great example to our students of how a democracy is supposed to function,” Perry said. “We look forward to another great year of providing high-quality education to our community.”

In a few multitown districts, school budgets passed without support from some individual communities.

The combined Windham-Raymond school district budget passed by a 100-vote margin, but voters in the much larger town of Windham actually rejected the budget by 26 votes, while Raymond voters approved it.

MSAD 6, the Bonny Eagle school district that includes five small towns in York and Cumberland counties, passed its budget despite rejections in three of the communities: Buxton, Limington and Frye Island.

And in MSAD 51, North Yarmouth said no to the $53.82 million budget proposal by 37 votes, but the larger town of Cumberland supported the budget and it passed in a combined total of 1,284-1,167.

Other communities, including South Portland, Portland, Scarborough, and Westbrook all passed their budgets by wide margins.