BERNE — Voters will decide on a Berne-Knox-Westerlo school budget that raises the overall tax levy by a half of a percent and maintains its current staffing and programs.

In a special meeting held Thursday afternoon, board members voted, 3 to 1, to adopt the 2015-16 spending plan of $22,304,857. Voters will have their say on May 19.

President Joan Adriance voted in favor, along with Russell Chauvot and Earl Barcomb, while Vasilios Lefkaditis was opposed. He and Gerald Larghe, who was absent Thursday, voted in split decisions against Chauvot and Barcomb just three days earlier. The board had been unable to adopt a budget with Adriance absent. She participated through video conferencing on Thursday.

In its final deliberations, the board wavered between raising the tax levy by 1 percent, 0.51 percent, or not at all. The third option, favored by Gerald Larghe and Vasilios Lefkaditis, meant capping the money spent on advanced programs such as New Visions or Tech Valley High School. The small tax increase, however, avoids that.

“It sounded like it would be tight if the numbers don’t line up,” board member Earl Barcomb, who voted in favor, said after the Thursday meeting, saying he wasn’t comfortable with the reductions proposed for the advanced courses.

Lefkaditis argued a budget is fluid enough that the specific reductions weren’t definite, in the context of the vote. He favored working within the same tax levy that was used this year.