Wiscasset selectmen got some welcome news from the federal government his week. The interest on the town’s loan for the sewer treatment plant has dropped. Town Manager Marian Anderson told selectmen Dec. 10, the town would save $22,000 or more on interest. The amount of savings won’t be known until the loan is finalized. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has asked to put off the signing until early January when interest rates may be even lower.

Anderson shared this information with selectmen and other details of the $1.98 million loan package used to upgrade the sewer treatment plant and infrastructure. The financing was approved by voters in November 2013 and included a $973,000 loan at an estimated interest rate of 2.75 percent financed for 29 years. The town received $226,000 in grant monies for the project. The interest payment over the course of the loan was estimated at over $452,000.

Now that the project is finished, Anderson said the loan payments were to be paid back in annual payments of $48,000. The first installment isn’t due until December 2016, although the town manager said William “Buck” Rines, treatment plant supervisor, had anticipated making a payment this year. Rines budgeted $49,177 to cover the first payment on the 29-year USDA loan.

Anderson said she had been in touch with the USDA to see how much the town might save in making an early loan payment. There’s no penalty for paying back the loan early, she added.

“Why would we sit on these loans all year and have them accrue interest when we can pay them back early and save?” Chairman Ben Rines Jr. asked.

Some of the board’s confusion was in not realizing sewer rates had been raised to repay the loans. Three selectmen, Rines, Judy Flanagan and David Cherry, weren’t on the board when the financing package was put together; although Selectman Jeff Slack and Judy Colby were. Both Colby and Slack recalled sewer rates were raised twice during their tenure on the board of selectmen. As Colby explained it, “The majority of the board felt the ratepayers were responsible for a greater part of the cost of the sewer upgrades.”

Rines said he certainly agreed with that. On Rines’s motion the board voted unanimously to authorize the chairman and treasurer to execute and deliver the USDA loan in the amount not to exceed $49,177.

After dispensing with this business, the board then entered in executive session for the purpose of union contract negotiations. Selectman Rines announced he was recusing himself from the negotiations. He explained he had been a member of the same union for 33 years. Before exiting he turned the gavel over to Vice Chairman Flanagan.