About 450  voters – a record turnout for a Woolwich special town meeting – packed the elementary school gymnasium Wednesday evening, June 24 and approved Patten Free Library’s 2026-27 funding request of $80,108. The article passed with 284 in favor of it and 158 opposed.

The meeting was delayed an hour as voters waited to be checked in by ballot clerks. At one point, the line stretched through the school’s lobby, out the door and around the front of the building.  “I’ve never, ever seen a town meeting crowd this large,” Selectman Dale Chadbourne told Wiscasset Newspaper as voters slowly filed into the gym. An extra set of bleachers behind the moderator was needed to accommodate the crowd.

“We’ve got a lot more people here tonight than we had for our annual town meeting. Clearly people are passionate about the library issue,” commented Selectman Jason Shaw. 

After Moderator Mike Field called the meeting to order, he said there’d be no amendments considered to increase or decrease the amount requested by the library. “The article as it’s written is to be fully funded, or not at all,” he said. If passed, he added, there’d be no need to take up a competing article for raising $8,500 to purchase library cards for residents unable to afford one.  Voters chose to buy the library cards when the same options were laid out in April at the annual town meeting. Field explained the decision to reconsider the issue was in response to legal advice the board sought from its town attorney and Maine Municipal Association.

Before proceeding, voters rescinded the library vote taken in April, Field calling for a voice vote which passed with no discussion. Voters then took up the $80,108 question to fund the library.  An equal number of residents spoke in favor and against the article during 20 minutes of discussion. All of the speakers adhered to a two-minute limit set by the moderator.

At 7:40 a motion to consider the question passed with a resounding majority of “yeas." It took another 40 minutes for voters to cast their ballots and have them sorted and counted by the ballot clerks. After Field announced the results, the other article was dismissed and the meeting adjourned. 

“I thought tonight’s vote would be closer,” Selectboard Chairman David King Sr. commented afterwards. In April, King had made the motion to buy library cards and urged voters to stick with that decision. He said the selectboard would abide by the will of the voters.