PELHAM - Town Meeting approved $583,000 in spending from free cash and the town's new capital equipment accounts, but postponed approval of a $3.5 million operating budget until June 13.

How much money the town can expect to receive in state aid is more likely to be known by that time.

Saturday's meeting ran to four hours, longer than Town Moderator Joan Temkin and others anticipated, because of many questions about expenditures.

Some residents said town officials should explain proposed spending more thoroughly before Town Meeting convenes.

On his last day as a School Committee member, Michael Hussin asked that Town Meeting approve paying School Committee members a modest stipend to recognize all the work that goes into the volunteer job.

School Committee members are responsible for overseeing two-thirds of town spending and hiring the superintendent, typically the highest-paid municipal employee. Paying school board members a few hundred dollars would be just an honorarium, Hussin said. "But it also might help with baby-sitting expenses for young parents."

Selectmen receive stipends of $1,200, assessors $500 to $1,000 and Board of Health members $150 to $200. School Committee members once received stipends, but the practice was discontinued.

Finance Committee Chairman John Trickey said it might not be a good idea to re-institute it. "At what point does this spiral into what we had years ago, that everyone got some kind of stipend?"

School Committee members have a particularly hard job, Library Trustee Jonathan Woodbridge said. "I'd have a part of my body amputated rather than serve on the School Committee. I'd give them $200 myself."

Town Meeting voted to leave it to the Board of Selectmen to bring the proposed stipend back to another Town Meeting.

At one point in the meeting, Molly Wolahan, who is a new to Town Meeting, said she would move to have consideration of all financial items postponed until June 13 so residents had more time to examine them. She later withdrew the suggestion.

Town Clerk Andy Lichtenberg said he, for one, is tired of the traditional opposition to proposed expenditures by the Police Department. "Every year there's an atmosphere of hostility and suspicion and it bugs me."

Big ticket items included $30,000 for a police cruiser and $23,000 to lease a cruiser; $11,000 for Police Department call record software; $86,972 for self-contained breathing apparatus for the Fire Department; $25,000 to paint the community center, $15,000 for maintenance of the Rhodes Building, $22,000 for a tractor, $8,500 to maintain the highway garage; $7,000 for a riding lawn mower; $5,000 for repairs to the Community Center boiler; $8,500 for an audit; $25,000 for unanticipated special education charges and $7,500 for new computers at the elementary schools.

Another $280,000 was approved for debt payments.

Two recipients of $1,000 scholarships from resident Thomas Lederle were announced. Luke Brown, who didn't realize he would be awarded the scholarship, said his mother Claudia Brown had asked him to come to Town Meeting because he would find it interesting. He did find it interesting, he said, although it could be an acquired taste for some members of his peer group, he said.

Chana Rose Rabinowitz, the other recipient, could not attend because she was participating in an Ultimate tournament.

Lederle also announced that he is donating a collection of encyclopedias to the school.

In the only contested election, also held Saturday, Christopher Rice was elected the new representative to the Hampshire Council of Governments.

Mary Carey can be reached at mary.carey@att.net.