By Kim Hilsenbeck.
A 28-member Hays CISD Growth Impact Committee on Thursday will finalize its ranking of 19 capital improvement projects developed by district officials.
Using a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 the highest and 5 not at all, committee members submitted their initial priority rankings at the Nov. 14 meeting. The top priorities were a new middle school and technology infrastructure upgrades and improvements.
Depending on the outcome of the committee’s discussions, district residents could see a bond of nearly $63 million on the May 2014 ballot. However, the more likely scenario appears to be a whittled down priority list in a bond package worth $54.6 million.
Hays Superintendent Mike McKie said that amount was originally $67 million, which was then revised to $62.7 million. However, he told the group that a lower bond amount would help with public perception.
“We didn’t feel comfortable saying we are going to push everything to the limit,” McKie told the committee at the Nov. 14 meeting. “We thought we needed to be conservative and let people know we are really looking at how we are spending taxpayers’ money.”
Bond debt can be used for construction of school buildings, equipment for school buildings, property for school buildings and new school buses.
The board-appointed committee will be tasked with trimming the administration’s revised list of capital
Bond Debt Facts Hays CISD new debt issue assumptions, with some data based on varying scenarios*.
Issue date: 8/01/2014 Maturity date: 8/15/14 – 8/15/44 First interest payment due: 2/15/2014 Call option: 8/15/2023 Underwriter’s discount: $6/bond Cost of issuance: $150,000 Project fund: $55,6 - $64,1 million Term of debt service25-30 years Tax increase: 7.37 to 7.87 cents per $100 Average Hays CISD home value $132,975 Annual impact to tax payer$98-$105 (depending on scenario)
*The coupons and credit spreads used in this scenario are an average of those recently used in comparable Texas school district deals. *In order to be conservative, an additional 15 basis point spread over Hays CISD’s historical average is incorporated.
The 2004 bond package included $47.7 million for two new elementary schools, one new middle school, traffic safety improvements to Hays High School, improvements to Kyle Elementary School, school equipment, school sites and new buses, $30.4 million for additions and improvements to Hays High School, additions to Lehman High, and additions and equipment at elementary and middle schools, and $8.8 million for band, physical education, theater and vocational classroom improvements to Hays High School. The 2008 bond package included two new elementary schools, a new middle school, $2.4 million for new buses, $2 million for the purchase of land, infrastructure and contingencies, $2 million for technology/security, $7 million for district-wide improvements, $1.3 million to improve the running tracks at Barton, Wallace and Dahlstrom middle schools, and $2 million for furniture, fixtures and equipment in the new schools. |
improvements.
Among the district’s 2014 wish list items are building a new 145,000-square-foot middle school, the district’s sixth, and upgrading district-wide technology infrastructure – the same items that earned top priority rankings from the committee.
If recommended and approved by the Board of Trustees, more than half of the potential bond – $35 million – would be for the middle school.
No site location has been identified, though a demographic presentation to the committee showed that most of the district’s middle school aged students reside on the east side of Interstate 35. Two of the five middle schools in the district are east of the highway.
Barton, Dahlstrom and Wallace middle schools are on the west side, but two of those schools have attendance zones that feed in from the east. All three buildings have already exceeded their functional capacity, according to an October 2013 analysis provided by the district.
While the campuses technically have higher building capacity loads, the hallways, cafeterias, gyms and other common areas of those campuses are not adequate to handle the projected increase of students.
Chapa Middle School is expected to exceed its functional capacity by 2015. Simon Middle School’s projections show it will not exceed functional capacity within the next five years.
Hays High School, along with Hemphill Elementary and Science Hall Elementary have also exceeded their functional capacity.
Other priority projects from school administrators include three critical Maintenance and Operations (M&O) projects: Replace the mechanical systems in Bales Gym ($903,571), replace the roof on Buda Elementary School lower campus ($1,365,000) and replace the mechanical systems in the Career Technology Building at Hays High School ($2,334,444).
District administrators told the committee that facility repairs between 1999-2010 ate up nearly half of the district’s M&O budget.
The last Hays CISD bond, passed by voters in 2008, was for $86.7 million. Under that debt, the district built three elementary campuses.
Voters passed an $87 million bond in 2004, despite overwhelmingly voting down a $105 million bond the previous year. The district now holds debt in the amount of more than $258 million, much of which was refinanced from the original $475 million debt accumulated since 2004.
The Growth Impact Committee will make its recommendation to the Board of Trustees at the Dec. 9 meeting, which takes place beginning at 5:30 p.m. in the Technology Annex at Hays High School.
