Wiscasset residents voted Dec. 9 to close Wiscasset Primary School.

Tuesday’s referendum ended in 367 “yes” votes to authorize the Wiscasset School Committee to close the school, and 133 “no” votes, Wiscasset Town Clerk Christine Wolfe said.

Tuesday’s decision upholds the committee’s majority vote in September to close the school after this school year.

The panel has looked to consolidate buildings to rein in Wiscasset’s higher costs for education following the town’s exit from Regional School Unit 12. The withdrawal, approved by residents a year ago, took effect July 1. Voters in June agreed to tap the town’s reserve account for $1,250,000 to lessen this year’s tax hit.

“I would just like to thank the town of Wiscasset for supporting us,” School Committee Chairman Steve Smith said Tuesday night. Now the committee can redouble its efforts to provide all students with a safe, secure learning environment and to make a smaller budget next year, he said, adding that a preliminary budget could be ready Feb. 1.

Smith wasn’t surprised that the vote went as it did, in part because a couple of the people he had heard from who supported the closure decision were primary school parents. The trust that showed for the committee indicated to him that the decision would stand, he said.

“That’s it, and we just need to be there for the kids .... We support the community,” primary school Principal Mona Schlein said of the vote’s outcome. On Wednesday, the school’s staff would talk with the students in small groups, to help them feel comfortable and confident about the changes ahead, Schlein said.

Andrea Main, a primary school and Wiscasset Middle School parent, filed a petition calling for the referendum on the committee’s decision to close the primary school.

Reached Tuesday night, Main said she was disappointed.

“I don’t feel that was the right decision, after looking at all of the facts, and I hope it was a decision that was made looking at all the facts. But it is what it is, and we’ll have to make the best of it,” she said.

“I think (the vote) is very definitive for the community, and I think that’s a very, very important thing,” Interim Superintendent Lyford Beverage said. “And it shows support for the committee, and that’s a very healthy thing.”

The referendum’s results were scheduled to be a topic on the committee’s agenda for a 6 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 10, meeting in the Wiscasset High School library.

Smith said the next steps are to prepare an educational plan in connection with the closure and show the Maine Department of Education that the school does not need to stay open, “which should be pretty obvious, given our (student) numbers. It’s pretty much a formality,” he said about that part of the closure process.