GREENE — At the annual meeting Saturday, residents approved funding for a Sabattus Pond Dam repair, along with funding for a new Main Street culvert project, but they rejected funding for a broadband expansion in town by a close vote, according to Town Manager Carol Buzzell.

Residents approved a funding request for $385,000 for the Sabattus Pond Dam repair, according to Buzzell. However, most of the project will be covered by federal grant money, which is expected to be awarded to the Sabattus Pond Dam Commission, reducing required funding from the town down to about $38,000.

Wales and Sabattus have already approved their share of the project cost, which is also $385,000 each — with the expectation that the cost will be reduced to $38,000 for them also after the grant funds are released.

There were two different funding options presented on the warrant under the article, to bond the cost or to raise all of the $385,000 through taxation. Residents chose to fund the warrant article using existing funds from undesignated funds. Whatever funds are not used will go back into the undesignated fund.

After much discussion on the warrant item, most of the residents at the meeting voted to approve the funding request, according to Buzzell.

With little discussion around a culvert project funding warrant article at the meeting, residents also approved a $350,000 request to replace a culvert on Main Street, according to Buzzell. Residents chose to have selectmen seek a three-year bond for the project at 6.59% interest rate.

The town was already awarded a $150,000 grant and had saved $347,075.84 in the bridge’s capital reserve account for the project. The new culvert will be a box culvert. The project has been the subject of town discussion for the last couple of years and Buzzell thinks residents were just ready to move forward with it this year.

Residents rejected a town warrant article in which the Broadband Committee asked for $186,000 to fund a Spectrum Internet broadband expansion along several roads in town that do not currently have access to broadband internet. In what Buzzell described as a close vote, residents rejected the article by a 69-52 vote.

There was one proposed amendment to the article, which would have raised only $136,000 through taxation then used $50,000 from the cable reserve fund toward the project but the amendment was rejected, according to Buzzell.

Before the meeting, many people expressed on social media their opposition to the funding request, feeling like residents along those roads should pay for the expansion themselves instead of putting the cost on the entire town. Buzzell heard people expressing similar sentiments at the meeting.

Residents at the meeting also wanted to know how many people on the roads slated for the expansion actually supported it and would use the service, instead of other internet service options in the area, she said.

“It was one of those things that they (Broadband Committee) should have checked with some of the people on those roads if they were in need of broadband,” she said.

In other business, residents approved a $46,387.82 roof project funding request for the Fire Department at the meeting — with the contract bid being awarded to Peter DeSalvo Contracting out of New Hampshire, according to Buzzell.

Overall municipal appropriations approved at the meeting were almost 3% higher than appropriations approved at last year’s meeting, going from almost $3.9 million to just over $4 million this year, according to Buzzell. It is hundreds of thousands lower than the overall amount initially requested by Selectmen and the Budget Committee.

Residents approved using almost $2 million in town revenues to reduce the overall tax commitment, Buzzell said.

Incumbent Selectman Kevin Mower was ousted by challenger George Farris Jr. by a vote of 76-50, according to Buzzell. Incumbent Maine Administrative School District 52 School Board member Kyle Purington was reelected in an uncontested race.