Recent gas prices excepted, cost drops can be hard to find. But Wiscasset got two good pieces of financial news Tuesday night: Bids on sewer work came in on the low side, and a generator for the municipal building will cost less than 10 percent of what voters agreed to pay for it.

The generator, funded for $25,000 at town meeting in May, will cost $1,500 as a result of a search of federal surplus goods, Town Manager Marian Anderson said. Public Works Director Doug Fowler will pick it up at the former Pease Air Force Base in New Hampshire, Anderson told selectmen Dec. 16.

It meets one of the specifications former selectman Bill Curtis had called for, Selectman Jeff Slack noted when Anderson described the generator. Curtis, 86, died Oct. 3.

On the sewer project, the town received multiple bids for each of the two different portions of work.

A $312,200 bid by Apex Construction of Rochester, New Hampshire, appeared to be the lowest one for a series of pump station upgrades, although town officials will study to the bids and compare their details; that will also be done for the bids that came in to repair or replace a sewer line that runs from about Federal Street, toward the shoreline, and to the wastewater treatment plant.

Of those, the lowest one Selectmen’s Chairman Pam Dunning read off was from Insitufarm Technologies, at $74,550.

After an earlier phase of the project was carried out, about $500,000 remains to complete the work, plant superintendent William Rines said. Tuesday’s apparent lowest bids for the two remaining portions total $386,750.

However, any savings could mean that at least some of the federal share of the project’s funding goes untapped, Rines told reporters. That’s because, under the deal with the federal government, the town’s share of costs has to be used first, he said. However, the town could ask to spend any leftover federal funds on additional sewer work, he said.

Rines was optimistic that the federal government would agree to the spending; the work he would seek consists of items the town considered for the current project, but that were left out to keep the total cost down, he said.

Let there be lights

Plans call for LED lights to light up the municipal building sign that announces meetings and town events. Fowler told selectmen he will be getting a price quote from an electrician to do the work. The letter sign’s traditional bulbs haven’t been working well due to a moisture issue and the vibration of vehicles traveling Route 1, Fowler said. Slack said the sign has been dark when he has been passing it on his way home from work.

Honor Sue Varney

Anderson announced that a retirement reception for longtime town employee Sue Varney is set for 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Friday, Dec. 19, at Wiscasset Community Center. Varney has worked about 37 years for Wiscasset. Her retirement from her job as assessors’ agent takes effect Friday.