SAD 67’s new budget was finally set Dec. 1, but Chester and Mattawamkeag taxpayers must wait at least another week before they get new local tax bills, officials said Wednesday.

Mattawamkeag’s Board of Selectmen will hold a town meeting at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at the town municipal building to set the mill rate, which selectmen hope to reduce from 21.40 mills to 20 mills, Town Clerk Lorna Pelkey said. All residents are invited to attend.

“Once the mill rate is set, on [Dec.] 14th, we will start printing the tax bills out,” Pelkey said Wednesday.

In Chester, Tax Assessor Ruth Birtz plans to have the tax bills ready on Monday for Jennifer Vachon, tax collector and treasurer, to mail out. They should be in the mail within a few days of that, Birtz said.

Birtz, who sets Chester’s mill rate, said she expects it to jump up considerably, from 13 mills to as high as 18 mills. The increase is attributable to a state mandated increase in the town’s SAD 67 assessment -about 30 percent – and a decrease in the state’s Homestead Tax exemption, she said.

Both towns’ efforts were delayed by voters’ rejecting three SAD 67 budgets since July 12. SAD 67 finally got a new budget, of $10.5 million, when about 450 voters from Chester, Lincoln and Mattawamkeag approved it during a town meeting on Nov. 29.

Birtz, who also works as Lincoln’s economic development assistant and a zoning enforcement officer, is still waiting for a copy of SAD 67’s budget to finish Chester’s mill rate.

“It is still less than most communities pay around here,” Birtz said. “It’s not caused by additional municipal expenditures. Chester’s expenditures actually went down this year. It’s forced primarily by what the schools demand.”

The ever-increasing school tax bills are part of the reason why many of the state’s smallest municipalities are applying to disband or disincorporate, she said.

Corrif Richards, Mattawamkeag tax collector and treasurer, said about 650 tax bills are mailed in the town. Another 175 or so are mailed in Chester, Vachon said.

About 3,800 Lincoln property tax bills went in the mail on Tuesday to town residents and businesses. The bills should arrive at town residences by today.

Town officials finished printing the last of the bills Monday night, Lincoln tax collector Marscella Ireland said. The bills cover the first half of the fiscal year and should cost individual taxpayers $300 to $3,000. The payments are due Jan. 10.

Mattawamkeag’s bills are due Feb. 28; Chester’s, on Jan. 31.

The SAD 67 delay had a negligible impact upon the municipalities. Mattawamkeag’s savings account declined from $200,000 to about $60,000 as town officials paid town bills, Pelkey said.