The recently approved $76 million Clarkston Community Schools bond could be paid off sooner than 30 years, Deputy Superintendent Shawn Ryan said.
“We didn’t want to cloud anything in terms of the election,” Ryan explained. “We knew very early on that Clarkston Schools took a very conservative approach to looking at financing these bonds over a period of years.”
The bond council evaluated the current bond market and taxable values of this past spring, which weren’t included in the proposition, he said.
“Based upon the increased property values in Clarkston this year, we’re going to take roughly five years off that initial projection,” he added. “So that’s five years off the top that we’re able to move as we work to settle these bonds.”
The interest amount should also be less than expected, he said.
“The bond council advised us in a conservative line, to take a four percent interest rate on those bonds,” Ryan said. “The current rate right now is closer to a little over 3.1 percent. Again that will reflect in a pretty sizable savings to the community, if this holds out on the next month or two months.”
The initial projections were done by the Industry Standard For Conservative Approach to Financing, Ryan noted.
“Nobody wants ‘gotcha moments’ of things to be extended or longer, but as soon as you secure things you can start to tighten them up to create a firmer financial picture,” he said.
Next steps
Over the next couple weeks, school officials will create a priority list of projects.
“Our goal will be to have zero percent waste as part of this entire project,” Ryan said. “Although we’d like to do everything on the first day, we need to create a system to involve Mr. (Wes) Goodman, (executive director of operations) and Mrs. (Angela) Harrison, (district administrator of technology) to help us look at what’s the rate we can implement both the technology and physical attributes of the buildings.”
The initial part of the process will be conducted by Ryan, Goodman, Harrison, GMB Architectural firm and Superintendent Dr. Rod Rock.
An ad hoc committee of board members, which includes Board President Steve Hyer, will review the priority list and then share the list with the entire school board.
“If we try to do every building at the same time, that certainly is more expensive than doing them one at a time,” Hyer said. “At the same token we have schedules we have to deal that there are no students in the building, only at certain times when we can work on them, so those are all priority pieces.”
Ryan said their plan is to sell the bonds “in very short order,” because 85 percent of that resource needs to be used within the first three years.
“There is a caveat based on the construction schedule that’s developed over the next couple weeks to create a small extension or second small series, just to make sure all the projects are completed in a timely way,” he explained. “That’s a typical industrial expectation when you sell bonds both to support these projects, so that will part of the overall plan.”
The next step will be to secure a construction management firm.
“Again it is our hope to do as many (projects) as we can to get out of the gate this year,” Ryan added. “But we’re not so hurried we’re going to become wasteful or do it in a way that’s irresponsible or waste any of the precious resources this community has approved for us.”
Board Treasurer Greg Need asked what the anticipated target for the sale of the bonds is. Ryan said if the bonds were sold in October, the funds would be available by November.