001okay can we call the meeting to order with the pledge of allegiance well good evening um and thanks for coming to the special meeting of the green castle school board on march 8th 2021. the only agenda item we have tonight is a public hearing on a proposed project i don't see anyone that will make comments but if you're interested in speaking at the hearing please make sure you sign in out front and uh after a presentation from the administration and advisors we will give people the opportunity to speak this notice of this preliminary determination hearing was legally or was published as legally required on february 24 2021 in the better graphic this time i will ask kristin mcclellan bond council to explain the purpose of this hearing good evening pursuant indiana statutes the school must
002hold two public hearings and adopt a preliminary determination in order to issue bonds greater than a certain threshold these public hearings and the adoptions of any resolution are the very beginning of the legal process the hearing and the resolutions you'll see next week truly just set the maximum amount of the project okay thank you very much now we will hear from mr jeff gibney about the process of determining and communicating the projects to the community and the need for the projects mr gibbetting yes as you recall back in the fall we contracted with krm architect group to conduct a facility assessment and help us build a master plan for green castle school district facilities we realize and recognize that we have some buildings and facilities to where there are items at the end of life
003to where there are spaces that are not conducive for the new type of teaching and learning that is taking place and then certainly there are some access safety and security type issues as well so it's been a very extensive process they've conducted focus group meetings at each of our buildings we held a community meeting this fall for some input and feedback and then they've been meeting with the the core planning team which is a smaller team of school district employees mr cox as a board member and then certainly all of the other professional advisors as well and so there's been a lot of time and preparation in in looking into this and um with some capacity that we have uh within our debt service pro excuse me our debt service fund with some space coming
004off we have some items that we need to address to remain current make sure things that are safe and secure and make sure we have a safe appropriate learning environment for our students so it's a very very exciting time and without further ado i will actually let krm mike montgomery share a little bit more about these projects good evening everyone and uh i'll just say next slide when we're ready for the next one um next one [Laughter] okay as mr gibbon stated there there was a master facilities plan completed that ran starting early september through january and included educators and the other individuals that mr gibney mentioned next slide um this is an example of the the campus existing conditions we went through uh each building as well as the overall campus next slide at
005each building and we'll quickly go through each one but there is an identification of the greatest needs the average needs and maybe longer range needs the red is the the most most important and those were done very early in the process and then through a series of evaluation of cost as well as importance uh the projects were assembled into a priority group and those are identified in the uh the dashed line box and this happens to be the high school you can see at the high school there's uh science classrooms the media center restrooms as well as other things next slide just some examples of things at the high school right right in the center door locks those are typical of many of the things that were included in this project next slide macanally primarily
006the the lower level locker rooms it's a magnificent facility but the lower level just hasn't had any upgrades or the ones they've had have uh are need some additional modifications next slide some of the existing conditions at mac and alley and the center two areas are really the the highlighted at the the locker room areas where the the funds will be geared next slide uh middle school at the middle school was secure entrance science labs and also the media center next slide some of the existing conditions one of the things that's included is some of the repairs of the envelope of the original building next slide deer meadow which is a one of the newer buildings or is the newest building is in pretty good shape really the only item there is the security entrance
007which is highlighted in in red there next slide some examples of deer meadow again it's in pretty good shape because it's new and well done at the time it was constructed next slide ridepath elementary also was remodeled and has a new addition that was fairly recent so it's in actually pretty good condition also um it does need a secure entry and there are some components of the exterior the building next slide some components of the exterior the buildings such as some of the stucco-like efas that need some attention to detail so those are those types of things are included next slide and then finally uh tz or to zonaka's elementary proposed for a new secure entry and one of the things that doesn't show up particularly well is several water issues or drainage issues at
008tz that are intended to be upgraded to improve the overall site and the condition of the building um next slide uh you can see you know some of the uh just the general appearance of tz and this lower image as some soffit part of the repair of the soffit all the way around the perimeter of the building it's pretty severely degradated next slide so the summary of costs they run down with the high school receiving most of the costs and as you walk down through um at seven million one hundred thirty eight thousand for the high school and uh five million five four hundred fifty seven thousand dollars at the uh the innovation center and classroom uh renovations and i won't read each one um but overall you get a feeling of the overall uh
009conglomerate of the of the costs that go to each area with a total construction cost of twenty six million eight hundred seventy seven thousand seven hundred thirteen dollars and then and that is dedicated uh towards uh construction and then the soft costs as they walk down through architectural engineering fees of two million fifteen thousand three twenty eight and you can see boring surveys and others in the soft cost 161 thousand owners representative fees of 445 000 which which brings the total soft cost to two million six hundred twenty two thousand two hundred ninety five dollars and then the third component in in the budget um as presented includes bond issuance costs and capitalized interest allowance the total 2.5 million dollars so that brings the total to 32 million dollars next slide so just uh in
010general a summary of where these dollars are proposed to go the high school by far receives the lion's share of the budget you can also see upgrades to the baseball and softball relocation which would move to the transportation site uh the primary schools which are other than tz which are in pretty good shape but tz does receive the lion's share of those costs middle school four million dollars and then the mcinally upgrades is a little over three million dollars so the totals again by facilities is 32 million dollars so that's it i think it's mike thurber thank you very much if you have any questions i'd be happy to answer them after mike's completed here okay thanks so now we will hear from mike thuber our financial advisor from thurber and brock about how the
011project or the proposed project will be financed as well as information about the effect on the typical property taxpayer mr thurber good evening uh thank you i would like to share some information tonight about first of all what the school corporation's current debt service picture looks like and then how these projects will be funded and what our plan for financing is right now from the corporation's debt service fund there are five series of bonds uh being paid and over the next six years all of those bonds will have matured meaning they all will have been paid at the end of this year and then again in 2024 and then again in 2027 um those bond issues your currently outstanding issues will be paid so it's a good time um now to be planning these proposed
012projects because essentially the overall plan is to replace the debt that's going away with the new debt that will um will be these 32 million dollars for the proposed projects um so the a few of the well please excuse me um if you would like to see well i guess we don't need to see um financial slides but um oh thank you great are we good yep thanks so uh what's on screen uh is basically recap of um what was just stated it's a good time to be financing uh new projects because uh the current plan is to replace old debt with new debt uh and then uh next slide please a few of the characteristics of this proposed financing the projects will be funded by one or more series of bonds with as mr
013montgomery just stated a not to exceed total project cost of 32 million dollars and approximately 29 million 450 000 of that amount will go toward the hard and soft construction costs we have allowed uh two million two hundred fifty thousand dollars for capitalized interest on the bond issue and we have uh budgeted three hundred thousand dollars for the issuance costs that are associated with the bond issue and those costs are comprised of the underwriting fee uh the financial advisor fee all legal fees uh the credit rating fee from standard poor's the trustee bank fee and miscellaneous fees that could include recording and items associated with the closing on the bond issue so all those amounts add up to again the uh not to exceed total project cost of 32 million dollars of note is that
014we have set the maximum annual lease rental payment on the bonds at two million nine hundred forty thousand dollars so the payment uh the annual payment on that 32 million would not exceed two million nine hundred forty 000 a year and the estimate uh on the debt service tax rate will be 61 cents however again as as your existing debt falls away as it is being paid from now until 27 and then after 27 the increase to the debt service tax rate from these projects will be zero there should be no increase to the tax rate as a result of these projects if you were to sell bonds today you would sell the full 32 million at an interest rate roughly a little under 3 percent and that would take you 16 or 17 years
015to fully repay that debt again if bonds were sold today so we've built a little bit into our estimates to account for any uh potential rise in interest rates that could happen between now and the time you go to sell bonds hopefully bond rates will hold uh where they are now hopefully they'll they'll decrease a little bit but but at least we'd like them to stay the same um and again it would take 16 16 and a half 17 years to repay that debt if it were issued today so those are just a few of the financial characteristics i'm happy to answer any questions or address any other issues that that the board would like so just to make sure i understand the tax rates not going to go up for the community due to
016these projects and in your opinion is the interest rate good right now for us to be borrowing or doing a bond i guess uh affirmative to both those mr cox uh bond rates are really good they are at uh historic lows we've been expecting a rise in interest rates for a long time now and a a material rise in rates or a big jump or a big increase in rates just has not happened there's a lot of speculation about when that will happen it's on the horizon no one really knows when that will take place though um i would expect bond rates to stay about where they are in the immediate future um we we will have our our finger on on that on the pulse um and after we take all of the necessary
017legal steps before we get to the point of selling bonds we will position ourselves uh to have a bond sale hopefully before any increase takes place so and the first part of your question there will be no increase to the debt service tax rate from these projects um the effect of these projects alone will be 61 cents however when that takes place or when you feel that effect you will have no other debt so we are truly replacing the debt that will have gone away with debt from these new projects and yes the there should be no increase to that tax rate okay thank you and just to clarify again um what kind of time frame are we looking at before we do or before we're ready to sell a few more months okay um
018[Music] we will have the second preliminary determination hearing next week right we will have the 30-day period after that we will have a lease hearing after that 30-day period ends and then by summer we should be in a position where um if it makes economic sense uh in other words if we um if we're ready to pull the trigger on the full 32 million or any part of that 32 million we should be in position to do that by mid-year this year mid-2021 sounds great else okay thank you very much thank you you're welcome okay now we will open this hearing for public comment um if we have anyone that does want to make the comment now is the time hearing none we will close the public comment section just to wrap up here please
019note that this is just the first step in the legal process no board action is legally required this evening or during this hearing rather this hearing is solely to hear public comment and the board will continue to work with administration and its professionals to look for efficiencies excuse me to conserve tax dollars while meeting our educational needs the board will hold a second public hearing in this board room or this auditorium on march 15 2021 at 7 pm and that will be in conjunction with our regularly scheduled march board meeting okay can i get a motion to adjourn make a motion second okay with motion and a second all in favor all opposed motion passes thank you all for coming you