Cape Elizabeth voters approved two referendum proposals on Tuesday’s town ballot: a $24.3 million school budget for 2016-17 and a $1.4 million upgrade to the solid waste transfer station.
The votes were 778-430 for the school budget and 685-530 for the transfer station. Voter turnout was 13 percent, or about 1,014 ballots cast among 7,800 registered voters, according to Town Clerk Debra Lane.
Voters were asked to authorize borrowing for the upgrade of the transfer station, which was the site of a fatal vehicle accident in November 2014. The redesign is expected to make the 37-year-old facility safer, more accessible, more efficient and more economical. It will replace the station’s large, below-ground-level hopper with several smaller, drive-by compactors.
The school spending package is nearly $751,000, or 3.2 percent, higher than the budget ending June 30. It’s part of a $37.8 million combined municipal, school and county spending plan that would increase the property tax rate by 66 cents, or 3.9 percent, from $16.88 to $17.54 per $1,000 of assessed property value. At that rate, the annual tax bill on a $300,000 home would increase $198, or 3.9 percent, from $5,064 to $5,262.
In a separate nonbinding question, 500 voters said the school budget was too high, 548 said it was acceptable and 129 said it was too low. The vote was 971-218 to continue holding annual school budget referendums for the next three years.
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