MADAWASKA – Within two weeks, residents here will be receiving their property tax bills, which should be quite similar to the 1999 bills they received.

The property tax rate remains at $19.70 per $1,000 of real estate valuation. A resident with a $50,000 home will be paying property taxes totaling $985.

The rate was established by the Madawaska Board of Selectmen on Wednesday night. Tax bills are expected to be ready for mailing to residents by Sept. 15.

The town needs to raise $8,863,389 to pay the town and school department expenses for the fiscal year which started July 1 and ends June 30, 2001.

The town’s valuation, the value of taxable real estate and personal property in the town, is listed at $378,030,615. Of the valuation, $8,813,000 is exempt under Maine’s Homestead exemption.

The taxes for the amount exempt under the Homestead Act, $173,616, will come from the state. That is deducted from the amount of money the town must raise with property taxes. Of the amount the town must raise for its expenditures, $375,762 is the town’s share of the Aroostook County budget. Municipal expenditures, approved by residents at the annual town meeting in June, amounts to $4,115,185. The Madawaska School Department budget, also approved at town meeting in June, needs $4,372,442.

The town expects to receive $350,000 from the state as its share of municipal revenue sharing.

According to documents released by Linda Cyr, the town’s bookkeeper, Wednesday night, the town expects to collect $1,077,618 from other outside sources.

With the real estate valuation the town has, and the approved tax rate, the town will raise about $11,431 more than it needs. The amount becomes the town’s overlay, that is money not approved for expenditure by the town or the school department.

The overlay is accrued annually, and funds from the account are usually brought to town meeting for special expenditures.

By law, the town can increase its property tax rate to raise as 5 percent of overlay. The town could legally have raised the overlay account by up to $371,789 with a tax rate of $20.70 per thousand dollars of valuation.

In Madawaska, however, the town has an agreement with Fraser Papers Nexfor, the town’s largest property tax payer, to keep the tax rate this year at the same rate it was last year.