Bow selectmen will begin trimming about $400,000 from the budget, combing through each of the town’s departments looking for cuts for a second straight year.

Board members will begin the process during a Thursday, June 12, meeting after residents voted at Town Meeting in May to trim the Budget Committee and Board of Selectmen’s proposed amounts.

Discussions were scheduled to begin June 5, but the meeting was canceled due to the conflicting schedules of board members.

“Nothing has happened. The selectmen canceled the first meeting because they couldn’t get a quorum,” said Town Manager Jim Pitts. “The target is to have it done by July 1, because that is when the new budget goes into effect.”

Selectmen Chairman Leon Kenison said last year’s cuts were made easier by a large amount that was eliminated during the process.

“Last year, we had a gold nugget in paving that we could eliminate. We don’t have that this year, and I don’t know what we’re going to do,” he said. “It won’t be easy and we didn’t get suggestions from those who were certain we could do this so easily without guidance. Most anything is on the table to start.”

Pitts agreed with Kenison that Bow residents will, for a second year in a row, see a decrease in certain areas.

“It’s a matter of identifying the services we normally provide that we’re not going to,” he said. “It’s up to the selectmen to decide where and when that will be.”

Following last year’s cuts, two of those services were several miles of scheduled paving and street lights, as the majority of the lights in town were shut off to conserve money.

“The hardest part is not being able to run through the regular budgetary process to talk to all of the departments,” said Kenison. “We’re given the charge of just doing it.”

According to Kenison, the structure of government needs to be looked at.

“We’re using the same government structure they were 250 years ago. We have to ask if this is appropriate in today’s economic and business structure,” said Kenison. “Would the candlemaker do it the same way we are? We need to maybe move onto some modifications, but that’s not for the next week or so.”

In terms of the budget cuts, Kenison said having to make them two consecutive years has made things difficult for selectmen.

“It is one pile on top of another,” he said. “I can tell you there will be some service cuts. There’s no fat left on this. It’s going to come up ugly to some for sure.”