Bond has assembly rethinking method

PALMER — With school bonds on the ballot two years in a row, the borough assembly and the school board discussed whether there was a better way to do major school projects.

Assemblyman Pete Houston, who put the topic on the agenda for Tuesday’s joint meeting of the two bodies, said the assembly was caught a off-guard a bit by this year’s raft of projects, which came to the assembly just before the deadline for getting them on the ballot.

“There was, I’m going to use the word ‘befuddlement,’” Houston said. “We didn’t have a lot of time.”

The bond propositions on the ballot this October total $31.7 million and include upgrades and repairs. There’s $3.4 million for fire alarms in 10 schools, $25 million total for new or repaired roofs at eight schools and items to address flooring replacements and improved handicapped access.

Houston, along with Assemblyman Rob Wells, was trying to see if there was different route to get the projects funded.

“Could there be a dedication of a funding source for major maintenance other than bonding?” Wells asked.

Houston pointed out that it seems like the district has a good idea at what point in a building’s lifespan a roof needs to be replaced. Couldn’t that money somehow be set aside?

The district’s facilities coordinator, Don Carney, said there are three ways the district can get money to do these types of projects — grants from private foundations and corporations, grants from the state, and bond propositions.

The first source, he said, is something he looks for over the course of the year. He files grant applications with a number of foundations and corporations.

The second option has been helpful but there are problems. The state often doesn’t fully fund a project. And the borough isn’t often at the top of the list because it keeps its buildings in such good repair. If the building isn’t falling down, it’s not an emergency the state needs to immediately address.

“We’ve got good buildings in the first place and they’ve been well taken care of,” Carney said.

One thing the borough could do, he said, is “buy” some points in the state’s ranking system for school projects. If the state sees the borough already moving forward in the planning stages, a project would move up in the statewide rankings.

The money spent drawing up plans and designing the project, Carney said, could then be repaid as part of the grant.

Houston said that if the borough is going to continue to ask for bonds to pay for such projects, the voters should be informed ahead of time so the projects don’t sneak up on them.

Borough Manager John Duffy and schools Superintendent George Troxel were tasked with coming up with a plan to do just that.

But Wells cautioned that two many bond propositions might wind up turning voters off to the whole idea.

“I hope they think about something called ‘bond fatigue,’” he said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.