Mattoon council approves ordinance to refund bonds

MATTOON -- The City Council during its meeting Tuesday approved an ordinance that has the potential to save the city more than $200,000.

The council authorized the issuance of general obligation refunding bonds, and Dan Forbes, a representative of Spear Financial, says the sale will begin today.

"The market looks extremely good," Forbes said at the meeting. "Again, people seem to say there is a real supply-demand imbalance right now...Meaning yields are extremely low.

"I expect to have good reception for the issue."

The substitute bond interest rates are anticipated to be about 1.82 to 1.9 percent, Forbes said "which should result in savings to the city in the very high $200,000 range, and we may do even better than that."

Forbes added that Moody's having reaffirmed the city's A1 bond rating should help.

"There has been a tidal wave of downgrades in the bond market of Illinois communities," Forbes said. "Moody's, for whatever reason, is looking very hard at its ratings, and basically downgrading people. The ratings are affirmed; the ratings report, which you may have already seen, talked about prudent financial management (within the city)."

In other business, the council approved the bid specifications for a window replacement project at Mattoon Police Department. The specifications will include different options for the different sides of the building. Police Chief Jeff Branson said they have received different ranges of estimates that leads administration to believe that at the right price they might be able to replace every window this year.

"During one our white-out snows this winter we had a pretty good sized drift on the ledge inside the building," Branson said about the need to replace the windows. Council member Dave Cox said the energy savings will make the project worthwhile to complete as soon as possible.

Gill said previously that the city has budgeted $55,000 for the replacement of the south side windows first, however the bid will request cost estimates for the replacement of the others as well, which would require a budget amendment. However, if the bids come back at a higher cost, the council will hold off and replace the other windows in later years.

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Mattoon council approves ordinance to refund bonds