Candia selectmen and members of the Budget Committee are at odds after a 2008 budget shortfall prompted officials to seek permission for an emergency expenditure from the Department of Revenue Administration.

On one hand, Budget Committee members say the fivemember Board of Selectmen failed to take adequate financial precautions after severe snowstorms in early 2008. Committee member William “Kim” Byrd said the “warning signs” were readily visible in the spring, when Road Agent Dennis Lewis warned officials that the winter storm money had already been exhausted.

“This shouldn’t have happened,” Byrd said.

But Selectman Joe Duarte said the late-year storms, particularly the devastating December ice storm, are what really “blew the budget out of the water.” On top of that, the 2008 payment on the bond for the new transfer station came in at a whopping $215,910. Although selectmen have the power to move money from one line item to another, Duarte said that in this case, there isn’t any money left to move around.

Selectmen Chairman Fred Kelley said officials “should have had a buffer” to help defray unexpected and last-minute costs, and he said the bare-bones budget put forward by the Budget Committee for 2008 left little in the way of a safety net. In an unrelated conversation in early December, Kelley had already begun to warn that the town was “almost out of money,” and he said on Jan. 5 that in the end it was the ice storm that “really killed Candia,” budget-wise.

Kelley said the town’s plan is to ask the Department of Revenue Administration -- the state entity which sets property tax rates -- if the town can draw some money from the unreserved fund balance. But he added if the town had “a buffer” of between $50,000 to $100,000, the request probably would not have been necessary.

Officials and residents said they could not recall a similar situation ever happening in Candia before, and at an emergency meeting Monday, Jan. 5, committee members and selectmen signed off on an $80,000 withdrawal request to the DRA.

Don Borror, an assistant of municipal services at the DRA, said Candia’s situation is far from unique this year.

In fact, he said there are “a small handful” of other towns pursuing similar requests to Candia’s right now, and in most of these cases, natural disasters also play a role. While Borror said he did not know about Candia’s case specifically, he said the process involves getting majority agreement from selectmen and the Budget Committee on what amount to request.

He said towns are also usually asked to provide a reason along with the request. According to law, this procedure is necessary in cases like this when a town is forced to make an expenditure in excess of the total budget approved by voters.

“And our procedure, if everything is in order along with a reasonable explanation, is that we usually approve it within a few weeks,” he said.

Selectmen said they have about $65,000 in unpaid bills, while there is less than $15,000 remaining in the 2008 general fund.