Gasoline costs worry Brewer city officials

BREWER – With recent gasoline prices reaching $3-plus per gallon, Brewer city officials are anxious.

The city locked in its heating oil at $1.62 per gallon for the winter, but must pay whatever is posted at the pump for gasoline to run city vehicles, City Manager Steve Bost said Friday.

“We anticipate a number of potential budget overruns relative to fuel,” he said after stating the city is very fortunate to have locked in the low heating oil price, which is shared with the school department.

“We’re obviously concerned about any one of our departments that’s heavily reliant on fuel,” Bost said, listing the fire and police departments and public works as the biggest users of gasoline for the city.

Fuel prices jumped to over $3 across the country after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast early last week, destroying one of the country’s biggest ports and shutting down numerous refineries and a massive pipeline that supplies fuel to the Northeast.

If fuel and gasoline costs remain high, requests also are expected to increase for general assistance, a taxpayer-supported “last resort” emergency assistance program that helps residents with rent, electricity, and medical and fuel costs, Bost said.

If such prices remain, the $75,200 that has been budgeted for general assistance this year will not be enough, the city manager said.

“We expect increased activity,” he said. “And we would anticipate that the cost of rentals in the area will begin to reflect the cost of fuel oil as well.”

The Brewer School Department has budgeted nearly $400,000 for transportation this year, mostly to bus students to and from school, but fortunately has contracts with Cyr Bus Line of Old Town so gasoline costs should not affect the district’s expenses, Superintendent Dan Lee said Saturday.

Transportation to and from school will not be cut, but field trips, music trips and athletic trips, which fall under separate budget lines, could be reduced if high gas prices continue, former superintendent Betsy Webb said Friday.

“Lester [Young, school business manager] and I had preliminary conversations about how it would impact field trips and sporting events,” she said. “Lester and the new superintendent will have to sit down and stay on top of that and stay very conscious of how it impacts [transportation].

“Fortunately, we have a locked-in price with the city [for fuel oil],” Webb said.

Lee, who recently was hired by Brewer from SAD 3, which spans 440 square miles in the Unity area, said rural districts are going to feel the gas crunch much harder than compact communities such as Brewer.

Lee, who called the Bangor Daily News on Saturday from Missoula, Mont., said SAD 3, which employs its own drivers, luckily locked in gas at less than $2 a gallon earlier in the year.

“A year ago I was getting it at 90 cents a gallon,” he said. “I have no idea what’s going to happen next year.”

The Brewer Police Department has $10,000 budgeted for gas this year, Acting Chief Danny Green said Friday.

“Obviously we are, just like everyone else, very concerned,” he said. “We are anticipating some conservation measures in the future. We expect we’re going to do something.”

Department heads soon will brainstorm on ways to keep gasoline expenditures low, the city manager said.

“We will be getting together at the staff level in the near future to discuss creating ways that we can conserve and still maintain the level of service,” Bost said. “That’s not necessarily going to be easy.”