I hope everyone is having a wonderful week! Our summer is moving quickly and we will have enrollment August 5th-7th. The district is preparing our facilities for the new school year and we look forward to having our students and staff back. Last week, we discussed the scope of our bond project with information related to what will be included in the new building. This week, we will discuss the financing portion of the bond and answer some questions that have been brought to our attention.
Bond Financing
The total project cost on the ballot is $39,464,695. The district has received $8,500,000 from the loss of the high school and additional funds for demolition. This will result in a bond of $29,900,000. Once approved by the voters, the district will not be able to take out additional bonds for the project.
The bonds will be paid back over the next 30 years. To help alleviate the cost of the bonds, the school district worked with the Rawlins County Commissioners and Kansas Legislature to allow the registered voters of Rawlins County to vote on a 1% sales tax. Once approved by voters, the additional 1% sales tax will move the sales tax rate to 8.5%. Compared to neighboring communities, the sales tax in Colby is 9% and the sales tax in St. Francis is 9.5%. A 1% county sales tax is anticipated to generate $525,000 a year. USD 105 would receive 97% of the proceeds from the 1% county-wide sales tax, which is $509,250 per year.
With the passage of the 1% county sales tax, the mill rate for the bond will be decreased from 32.5 mills to 24 mills.
How does the Bond Affect Taxpayers?
With the 1% County Sales Tax:
$100,000 Residential Property: $23 per month
$100,000 Commercial Property: $50 per month
Agricultural Property:
Dry Land Crop Land-$1.32 per acre annually
Irrigated Land-$3.46 per acre annually
Grass Land-$0.23 per acre annually
As a note, property tax on agricultural land is calculated by productivity, so the above numbers are estimates.
FAQs
Below are answers to the questions that patrons have been asking.
Construction Timeline with Bond Passage:
The USD 105 Board of Education has given permission for SPT Architecture to begin drawings for the 7th-12th portion of the new building. Once the bond is passed and plans are completed, the plans must be sent to the Kansas State Fire Marshal's Office for approval, and construction bids will be sent out for the school board to approve. With the plans already in development, construction is anticipated to begin in October with voter approval on August 6th. If the bond election is approved by the community at a later date, such as the November election, the start of construction will be further delayed until the end of January. While the district does have insurance funds, it is highly recommended that the district begins construction once the funds are secured with the passage of the bond election. If the district begins construction without all funds secured, the district will place the community at risk of increased costs due to the possibility of having to stop construction until funding is secured and/or having to change the plans of the building to what the community will support. It is also not in the best interest of the district to begin construction on a building that has not been approved by the community.
Why is there only one question on the ballot?
Ballot questions can be very confusing. They must include a lot of information and tend to be very lengthy. The School Board was presented with two questions written in “ballot language” and even though they had studied the project for several months, it was still confusing. We also had two community surveys that each had over 70% support for a K-12 building and 98% of the staff supports a K-12 building. The County Sales tax question will also be on the ballot on August 6th and to communicate how this would affect each option would only make it more confusing. It is very difficult to communicate information for a bond issue. Our architects and bond finance consultants recommend that we keep the approach to the bond project as simple as we can.
What will happen to the Elementary School?
The district is considering several options but there is not a permanent plan in place yet. One option is to sell the property to an investor, who could turn the building into apartments or a business. Another option is to demolish the classrooms on the east side and keep the gym and cafeteria as a community center. A third option is to demolish the whole building and use the property to build new homes. The goal is to ensure this property is not a burden on the taxpayers. If the bond passes on August 6, we have two years to determine the best use of the property. We cannot determine a final answer for this until we know if the voters will approve the bond to build the K-12 building.
Go Buffalos!!