By 8 p.m. on May 11, 2,341 town voters had completed budget referendum ballots for the proposed town and education budget for the fiscal year 2011-'12. The verdict: both budgets failed.

A total of 1,432 voted "No" on the town's $14.5 million budget with 903 voting "Yes." For the Board of Education's $31.5 million budget, 1,413 voted "No" and 924 voted "Yes." Out of 9,004 registered voters in the town of Clinton, only 2,341 or 26 percent voted.

Because both budgets failed, they were immediately received by the Board of Finance for further reductions.

The town's proposed $14.5 million budget represented a $453,064 or 3.19 percent increase over the $14.17 million budget for 2010-'11. The $31.5 million education budget represented a $553,030 or 1.78 percent increase over the 2010-'11 budget of $31 million.

Complicating the rise in proposed expenses was the 9.8 percent, or $160.5 million decline in the 2010 Grand List—now $1.49 billion down from the $1.69 billion Grand List from 2009. The projected tax rate increase will be 2.36 mills based on just the Grand List decrease; on top of that, the town and education budget would have added a 0.58 mill increase bringing the total tax rate to 25.35 mills.

A public hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, May 18 to discuss the reduced budgets. A second referendum is scheduled to be held on Wednesday, May 25 at William Stanton Andrews Memorial Town Hall.