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Certificates of Participation sale to fund school projects

Bethany Fuller | .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) | Feb. 28, 2008

Statesville High School Principal Larry Rogers and Kenny Miller stood in a mobile classroom Monday trying to reach a compromise on the air conditioning vents in Rogers’ new office.

With the first round of renovations completed at Statesville High, Rogers is shifting students and staff members in and out of buildings and mobile units so construction crews can demolish and rebuild part of the school.

The $13.25 million renovation is one of the nine new school capital improvement projects Iredell County will finance for the next 20 years.

Commissioners will be asked to sign off tonight paperwork for $106 million in certificates of participation (COPS) sale.

If the sale closes as expected on March 12, 2008, it will add to the county’s $240.48 million debt.

The $106 million will go toward building three new elementary schools, upgrading two high schools, renovating Mooresville Intermediate School and expanding three elementary schools.

Iredell-Statesville Schools, which operates most of the schools in the county, will receive more than $80 million from the COPS sale, while the Mooresville Graded School District will receive $26 million.

The list of projects was recommended by the 2006 School Facilities Task Force in order relieve overcrowded conditions in schools and give some room to grow.

I-SS will use its share of the money to build two new elementary schools and expand three others.

Most of those expansions involve bringing elementary school capacity up to 800 students.

Miller, director of facilities and planning for I-SS, said a school’s capacity rate changes at the N.C. General Assembly’s will.

“Capacities do not stay the same,” he said. “They give you the teachers, but they don’t give you any place to put them.”

County Manager Joel Mashburn said county commissioners and officials factored in the additional debt associated with the COPS into the 2007-08 tax rate of 44.5 cents.

The cost of the school projects nearly mirrors the first phase, which started in 2006.

In 2005, Iredell County voters approved a General Obligation Bonds worth $67.5 million. In 2006, the county sold $44.7 million in COPS to pay for the first round of projects.

“(The General Obligation Bonds) didn’t cover all of it, and it wasn’t intended to,” Mashburn said.

Steve Young, MGSD’s operations director, said said school district only budgets a small percentage for capital improvements.

“Usually, the school district’s budget is involved more in outfitting the school,” he said.

In September, county commissioners approved a reimbursement resolution to allow school administrators access up to $90 million in preliminary funds from one of the fund balances.

Mashburn said the state requires commissioners to pass the resolution so school officials can refund the money used on preliminary work, such as architectural designs.

Since the projects haven’t been bid on yet, commissioners only have a preliminary estimate of the total costs.

Both school districts already have an idea of what they want.

The new Coddle Creek Elementary School on Presbyterian Road will follow the Third Creek Elementary School design. The $19.1 million school is expected to relieve some of the overcrowding at Lake Norman, Mt. Mourne and Woodland Heights Elementary Schools.

I-SS also plans to spend $16.9 million to replace Northview and Ebenezer Elementary.

The school district plans to complete its phase II projects by Summer 2009.

Young said MGSD is planning to expand some of its existing facilities, and is adding a campus off of Coddle Creek Road.

The district plans to build a new elementary school for 720 students, but design the media center, gym and cafeteria for 920 students.

“That gives us the option of going back later on,” he said.

County Finance Director Susan Blumenstein said county officials do not know what the interest rate on the COPS will be until they are sold. Right now, the county is projecting a 4.56 percent interest rate.

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