TPS board puts off discussion on future bond issue
7/8/2008The Toledo Board of Education did not discuss starting the process of putting a bond issue on the November ballot as they had intended during a special meeting Tuesday morning.
Two people on the five-member school board - president Steven Steel and Darlene Fisher - are on vacation and were not able to attend the meeting, scheduled for 9 a.m. in the Thurgood Marshall Building.
The school district has until July 22, 105 days before the Nov. 4 election, to submit letters and other preliminary documents to the Department of Taxation and Superintendent of Public Instruction relaying their intent to but a bond issue on the ballot.
Another meeting will be scheduled prior to that deadline to give all board members input.
What Toledo Public Schools is considering is voter approval to revise the November, 2002, bond issue passed for the Building for Success plan.
That bond issue authorized the district to issue enough bonds to cover 23 percent of the costs of the district's building plan, while the Ohio School Facilities Commission provides 77 percent of the dollars.
At that time, the school district's entire building campaign was about $800 million, but since has been scaled back to $620 million.
The amount of bonds to be issued locally for the districts 23 percent were also scaled back by about $37 million.
With voters' approval in November, it might be possible for the district to still issue the bonds for the larger project and use that $37 million for additional capital improvements outside the state plan, such as renovations.
The following article appeared in earlier editions of The Blade and toledoblade.com.
Toledo schools mull bond issue
The Toledo Board of Education will meet this morning to discuss the possibility of a bond issue to put more money into the district's building plan.
During the 9 a.m. special meeting in the Thurgood Marshall Building, board members will discuss filing the preliminary documents for a bond issue on the Nov. 4 ballot.
The process actually would be revising the November, 2002, bond issue passed for the Building for Success project.
The bond issue passed in 2002 was to pay for 23 percent of the building plan, while the Ohio School Facilities Commission provides 77 percent of the dollars. At that time, the school district's entire building campaign was $800 million, but it since has been scaled back to $620 million.
With voters' approval in November, it might be possible for the district to issue bonds for what its share was to have been of the larger program, then spend that money for the reduced program but have some funds to do further work outside the state-supported plan.
It could mean access to an additional $37 million without raising taxes beyond the 4.99 mills that voters approved in 2002.
The deadline for filing issues for the November ballot with the board of elections is Aug. 21.