Gov. John Baldacci vetoed a bill Monday that would have amended the school consolidation law to allow for school unions and give local school committees control over their budgets - a veto the Senate let stand in a strong, 23-to-12 vote.

The bill was written on behalf of the existing school union now serving Mount Desert Island and had some powerful advocates, including the majority leaders in both the House and the Senate.

But in the end, most Democrats in the Senate stood behind their chief executive. A dozen Democrats, who supported the union bill a week ago, voted against the motion to override the governor's veto.

The bill is now dead.

Sen. Dennis Damon, D-Hancock, who introduced the bill on behalf of his constituents on Mount Desert Island, said he was disappointed by the outcome.

"I thought we had enough momentum and understanding to do the right thing for schools," Damon said, looking back on a previous vote where the union bill was supported 24-to-11. "This takes away the opportunity, some would argue the right, of communities to have local control in regards to their schools."

Damon said the only fallback now for those who refuse to give up their union is to disobey the school consolidation law passed last year and accept the penalties in the form of a cutback in state aid. There are more than 120 communities currently in unions statewide.

The administration opposes unions because they allow local school boards to have power over budgets and teacher salaries rather than have regional boards make those decisions. Not only would that create more districts than the 80 called for in the school consolidation law, the administration believes it is a less efficient way to run schools.

In a letter to the Legislature, Baldacci explained his veto of the bill.

"The bill would allow for the formation of `super unions,' which would encourage more bureaucracy and allow for the expansion of an inefficient means of school governance. Maine would likely end up with more school districts, not fewer. Further, the bill would decrease the transparency of the budget validation process and increase confusion, making it more difficult for voters to get a complete picture of how their tax dollars are being spent on education," Baldacci wrote.

With the union proposal dead, the governor will introduce his own bill that makes changes to the school consolidation law to allow the regionalization process to move forward. Districts had reportedly stopped work on creating new districts to see what happened to the union bill.

Baldacci's bill would allow for more flexibility in cost-sharing among cities and towns coming together in a new unit to avoid cost-shifting onto property-rich communities. It also would remove the requirement that all communities, regardless of how many children they send to school, have to pay at least two mills on their property tax toward education. And, it would assure that current minimum receivers of state aid would not lose that money in a new district.

Those changes are seen as critical to allow new districts to form because local voters would likely not support something that ended up costing them substantially more money. All new districts have to be approved by voters at the polls by November of this year.

There is another bill currently tabled in the House that would make other changes to the school consolidation law, including delaying the vote to form new districts until January of 2009.

Those who want to see the entire law overturned plan to introduce an amendment to that bill that calls for complete repeal.

Rep. Peter Edgecomb, R-Caribou, will be the sponsor of the repeal amendment in the House and Sen. Kevin Raye, R-Washington, will sponsor one in the Senate if Edgecomb's isn't adopted.

Those voting in favor of overriding the governor's veto included Damon; Sen. Bruce Bryant, D-Oxford; Sen. Dana Dow, R-Lincoln; Sen. Walter Gooley, R-Franklin; Sen. John Nutting, D-Androscoggin; Sen. Joseph Perry, D-Penobscot; Sen. Debra Plowman, R-Penobscot; Sen. Kevin Raye, R-Washington; Sen. Christine Savage, R-Knox; Sen. Roger Sherman, R-Aroostook; Sen. Lois Snowe-Mello, R-Androscoggin; and, Sen. Carol Weston, R-Waldo.