EAST MILLINOCKET — Residents will consider purchasing a new street sweeper and a new ambulance at a cost of $165,000 during a special town meeting today.

If voters approve the purchases, the new vehicles will be paid for with funds from reserve accounts. The special meeting will be held at 6 p.m. in the municipal building.

Administrative Assistant Peggy Daigle said the town planned to replace its 19-year-old street sweeper in 1995. Limited financial resources, however, prevented the purchase. The town is still under a tax cap and must reduce the amount of money it raises in local taxes by 4 percent. Also, the town did not have enough money in reserve accounts then to purchase it, but since has been able to add funds to the reserves to make the purchase.

As they began to prepare the annual May town meeting warrant, town officials realized they did not have voter authorization to spend from the reserve accounts, Daigle said.

Officials said if the town waited to get voter authorization for the purchase at the May 20 town meeting, they would not receive a new sweeper until late June or early July.

“If we had the authorization, we would have bought it by now, because we want to make sure it gets the sand up off the roads in a timely fashion for residents,” said the administrative assistant.

Officials say the 1978 model sweeper is in extremely poor operating condition and the town can no longer buy replacement parts for it. Voters will be asked to approve up to $85,000 for the sweeper purchase.

Also, voters will consider spending up to $80,000 from the reserve account to buy a new ambulance.

Currently the town has two ambulances, a 1991 model with more than 60,000 miles on it and a 1988 model with more than 90,000 miles. East Millinocket not only provides its own residents with ambulance service, but also has contracts to provide the service to the neighboring towns of Medway and Woodville, as well as Penobscot County. The town also provides advance life support services to the town of Patten.

Les Brown, supervisor of the town’s ambulance department, is proposing that the town keep the two ambulances it has along with the new one. He said the 1988 vehicle still would be licensed to operate as an ambulance and it would carry emergency equipment, such as extrication tools.

Brown said patients had to wait on many nonemergency hospital transfers or go with another service. With only two ambulances, Brown allows only one to be out of town, so the other can respond to emergencies.

With three ambulances, Brown said the town could allow two vehicles to be out of town at the same time and would still have one in town as a backup for emergencies.