CLEARFIELD – At Monday night’s regular meeting, the Clearfield Area School District Board of Directors approved refinancing more than $5 million in outstanding bonds after learning it had tripled its minimum savings target for both the 2003 A and B bond issues and a 2002 bank note.
Gregg McLanahan, senior management consultant with Public Financial Management in Harrisburg, said that the district’s total savings would be $90,824.
“At no point could the savings have been any better than today. It might have been a little luck, but I’ll take it,” he said, of the bonds’ Internet auction.
He said that the district had 45 bids from six different underwriting syndicates. He said that Roosevelt & Cross, Inc., of New York, was the winning bidder with a 2.42 percent interest rate.
“We had unusually good results from the bidding. And, there was quite a bit of difference in the interest rates from top to bottom,” McLanahan said.
At the end of January, the board authorized the bond refinancing if it met its minimum savings figure of $30,000.
Jamie Doyle, senior management consultant with Public Financial Management, presented a refunding analysis at last month’s committee meetings. She said that the 2002 bank note wasn’t included in her presented figures, however.
“(The municipal bond index fixed rate) headed down and in a rapid fashion here at the start of 2009,” she said.”
According to her analysis, the district’s current rates for the 2003 A and B bond issues ranged from 3.100 to 3.650 percent. If it proceeded, the district could see rates from 1.330 to 2.080 percent.
“The rates do wiggle around some. By the time we would get around to (initiating the paperwork), it could be slightly different numbers,” Doyle said.
Doyle said then the Comparative Internet Sale would follow on Feb. 23 with a settlement on April 9.
“There isn’t a downfall in doing this,” business manager Sam Maney said.