09-24-18 Council Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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REGULAR MEETING September 24, 2018 Mr. Rompola replied, Right, and you're not. You are not locked into a twenty (20) year with this bill. It will be the Controller's Office, with Herschel's advice,making that determination just prior to the bond sale telling the underwriter here is what we want to see in terms of the bond maturity schedule. Councilmember Oliver Davis interjected, And you can give us that information right when you make that final decision and send it to the Council and we will be able to share that with our people? Mr. Frierson replied, I will work with the Controller's Office to communicate parameters of the final decision that will be economically feasible for the City. Councilmember Oliver Davis stated, Ok. I look forward to that document and if that could be a regular pattern because I haven't seen one (1) of those in the past but I will be requesting more going forward because there is a history of us saying twenty (20) plus twenty (20) then thirty(30) and everything else. We are getting a lot of pressure on us because it is working in the short term but people are saying what are we doing for our future? What are we doing from that standpoint and can we cover some of that under our good days because we don't know what challenges come down the road? As much as we can take care of in sun shine it would be better for us to do that instead of wait for the rain. I appreciate your time. Councilmember Jo M. Broden asked, So you were tasked with that twenty (20) year framework, right?Not to exceed that. So this is coming to us at this point and I want to know if you looked at other lengths and terms and crunched those numbers? You obviously came with a final product that is capped at twenty (20) years. So let me know that you either were asked to look at shorter terms and what those were and then if it's you or whoever else in the Administration, why did we hone in on the twenty (20)year cap? I understand the flexibility but does that make sense? Mr.Frierson replied,Yes and I appreciate the question. So,in working with the Controller's Office, in lieu of$3.7 million, we looked at the, and the desire was,to the look at a twenty (20) year. One (1) of the other caveats of that was looking at the asset of what was to be built. We wanted to stretch out the life of the bond to match the life of the asset. If it is the desire of the City, we can look at something shorter but in lieu of the life expectancy of the asset, that was the desire. Also, there are other potential commitments from the economic development portion of the Local Income Tax. We can look at something shorter. Councilmember Jake Teshka stated,I think you just hit on something that is important and that we touched on in Committee. I want to understand this too. I would much rather pay $3.7 million in cash. But what Ms. Hockenhull said in Committee was that this will be paid out of a fund that already has commitments that we are obligated to. So in essence, and this gets to the complexity of City budgeting and all of the different funding sources but, because it is coming out of EDIT funds, and we are already obligated to pay certain other things, we can't exceed a certain amount of debt service in a year. Is that correct? Mr. Rompola and Mr. Frierson confirmed, That is correct. Councilmember Oliver Davis interjected, The only thing about that is the fact that we help set those priorities and a part of that EDIT Fund and so therefore if we know this is going to help us save on this, then we can adapt or massage some of the priorities. When I was getting my house and the gentleman told me that it would be better to look at a fifteen (15) year mortgage, I just adjusted some of the other things because if I adjusted that bill to pay for that one (1)then I would get my house paid off faster. So when I looked at my priorities and he made that presentation to me, all of the sudden my priorities changed. You know, because, here I could have my house in fifteen(15) years and whatever I was going to spend that other one hundred dollars ($100) on per month,I can adjust that to something else or get a second(2nd)job and teach more clients and take care of that and then take care of this. So,while your point is well taken,if we see that other option then since we control with the input of the Controller's Office of what our priorities are, then we can say yeah we have these things but if we can save money with this then let's adjust our priority that way and come back from that way. So I see what that is. Do you see what I'm saying? 22