{"id":17248,"date":"2010-08-05T20:58:02","date_gmt":"2010-08-06T00:58:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/miserybay.usanethosting.com\/wordpress\/?p=17248"},"modified":"2010-08-05T20:58:02","modified_gmt":"2010-08-06T00:58:02","slug":"school-14","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/school-14\/","title":{"rendered":"A+ rating allows interest savings of more than $43 million"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bond Update<\/strong>
\nSt. Johns Public Schools will save more than $43 million in interest over the life of the bonds recently sold to finance facility improvements throughout the district\u2014most notably an extensive renovation to St. Johns High School.
\nThe district received an A+ rating by Standard & Poor\u2019s due to a number of economic factors associated with the school district and Clinton County. In May, voters approved the sale of more than $64 million in bonds to fund improvements to the district\u2019s facilities, technology and the purchase of propane-fueled buses.
\n“Clinton County enjoys a relatively stable economy compared to other counties throughout Michigan,” said John Czarnecki, executive director of the Clinton County Economic Alliance. “Our unemployment rate is lower than surrounding counties, and the St. Johns school district has done a good job in maintaining its funding equity and budgeting appropriately. All of these factors contribute to the favorable bond rating.”
\nThe high bond rating as well as the federally insured bonds will save taxpayers $43 million in interest over 30 years\u2014translating to fewer tax dollars required in order to retire the debt. The overall interest rate works out to be around 3.5 percent.
\nWhile construction will not likely begin at the high school until the summer of 2011, a number of less obvious steps are happening behind the scenes. For instance, the Spicer Group of St. Johns is surveying the school properties as part of the bond project. The contract, valued at $28,500 was awarded by the Board of Education in June.
\n“We are very pleased we could award one of the first contracts under the project to a St. Johns company,” said SJPS Director of Finance Roy Piggott. “As we discussed during the bond campaign, we believe the project will be beneficial to our local economy.”
\nIn July, the Board of Education approved the purchase of 20 propane-fueled buses from Holland Bus Company, located in Holland, Michigan. The district will take delivery on the buses this month or next. It is anticipated that a fuel savings of between $65,000 and $85,000 will be incurred as a result of the purchase. Propane-fueled busses meet EPA emissions standards that take place 2014. Currently marketed diesel-fueled buses do not.
\nThroughout the latter part of the school year and into the summer, teams of staff and community members have dedicated countless hours to planning for the renovation and additions to the high school.
\n“It\u2019s a huge undertaking,” high school principal Mark Palmer said. “The high school staff is very excited and we\u2019ve had some great meetings to encourage people to think outside the box.”
\nPalmer said he\u2019s been asked multiple times about when construction will begin.
\n“It\u2019s tough to tell people that it won\u2019t be for another year, but we want to get it right. So, taking our time with planning is important. Proper planning will allow us to get the most for our money, and allow us to get a complete picture what is and is not possible. We want to construct a facility in which the community will take great pride.”
\nHe said he\u2019s also fielding a number of questions about the stands at the football field.
\n“People have noticed that we\u2019ve removed a number of sections on the home side,” he said. “Those stands were unsafe and needed to be removed.”
\nPalmer said that the district has arranged for temporary additional seating for the upcoming football season, and perhaps, the 2011 season. Due to the time required to complete the renovations, construction at the football field will begin following the 2011 season. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bond Update<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-schools"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17248\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stjindy.com\/archive1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}