Granite Shoals eyes adding water bond to ballot

By Nathan Hendrix
Staff Writer

Granite Shoals officials are working with the city's bond counsel to begin drafting an ordinance that would place a $7 million bond proposal for water system upgrades on the ballot in November.

Richard Donoghue, of McCall, Parkhurt and Horton, said the city would need to approve the ordinance at the Aug. 13 regular meeting in order to get the bond package on the November ballot for voter approval. He said the work should begin as soon as possible to start clarifying the ballot language.

“We have to make sure we're all very comfortable with the dollar amounts and the words that we use to describe the project we'd like to take to the voters,” Donoghue said.

The bond proposal is for $7 million to be used for surface and groundwater projects, including work at the treatment plant, distribution center, generators and electrical substations and 46,000 feet of pipe that need to be replaced.

City officials said the first payment on the 2019 bond would begin in 2021, and the bond will likely be a 20-year commitment. Donoghue said the city has the option for a longer term.

“We can go up to 40 years,” he said. “In the last bond election, we put a 40-year maximum in there to give the financial advisor flexibility to structure the bonds in a way that would work best in the market at that time.”

Council member Todd Holland said he is “strongly opposed” to a 40-year plan.

The city's plan is to make bond payments using $60,000 annually from water revenue in order to avoid raising the interest and sinking tax rate. . . .

Find the rest of this story in the Tuesday, July 2 issue of The Highlander, the newspaper of record for the Highland Lakes. To offer a comment or news tip, email nathan@highlandernews.com. To subscribe, call 830-693-4367.