I would urge the council to find ways to use the funds to cover currently budgeted expenditures, rather than looking for new projects. Use this as an opportunity to lower our skyrocketing property taxes.
Maybe this is a blessing in disguise? If we haven’t sold the new school bond yet, maybe we can apply this bond dollars to the geo-thermal portion of the new school. It would still fall within the climate reducing purpose of the solar panel initiative (bond already sold), and we might be able to save the taxpayers the premium cost of the 4 million cost overrun of the original new school bond.
This money was raised for a specific item. The money should be paid back and not just used for other things that are not voted on. Just because the town voted to raise this money does not mean that if the original plan is now defunct the town can use this money for any and all "pet" projects. The residents voted for one use and one use only. When the hell are the town councilors going to tighten their belts and start to understand that the vast majority of the taxpayers can not afford to keep paying the tax increases. and fund "feel good projects". If a project cannot pay for itself and/or save us more than the cost of said project then we need to stop funding them. PLEASE it is time to put the taxpayers first.
Bruce, Unfortunately that's not how bonds work, We cannot simply pay it back as the bond has already been sold and the investor(s) who purchased it expect their ROI, it is not legal for us to simply give it back. We could just put it in a bank account to use for the payments, but the interest rate earned will be less than the interest rate paid and we would just lose money. Using this money for similar projects is the best use, None of these are "Feel good" projects, they are all projects that will have an impact to the residents of Bar Harbor.
As for paying for things not voted on, That's exactly why this is going on the November ballot, to be voted on. We cannot just spend the money without voter approval in November.
I know this Matt I just wish I could go back the days of my childhood when this was a town where everyone knew everyone, and life was simpler. I remember when the whole town and all the tourist turned out for the QE2’s first visit. Little did we know then our future.
I would urge the council to find ways to use the funds to cover currently budgeted expenditures, rather than looking for new projects. Use this as an opportunity to lower our skyrocketing property taxes.
Maybe this is a blessing in disguise? If we haven’t sold the new school bond yet, maybe we can apply this bond dollars to the geo-thermal portion of the new school. It would still fall within the climate reducing purpose of the solar panel initiative (bond already sold), and we might be able to save the taxpayers the premium cost of the 4 million cost overrun of the original new school bond.
This money was raised for a specific item. The money should be paid back and not just used for other things that are not voted on. Just because the town voted to raise this money does not mean that if the original plan is now defunct the town can use this money for any and all "pet" projects. The residents voted for one use and one use only. When the hell are the town councilors going to tighten their belts and start to understand that the vast majority of the taxpayers can not afford to keep paying the tax increases. and fund "feel good projects". If a project cannot pay for itself and/or save us more than the cost of said project then we need to stop funding them. PLEASE it is time to put the taxpayers first.
Bruce, Unfortunately that's not how bonds work, We cannot simply pay it back as the bond has already been sold and the investor(s) who purchased it expect their ROI, it is not legal for us to simply give it back. We could just put it in a bank account to use for the payments, but the interest rate earned will be less than the interest rate paid and we would just lose money. Using this money for similar projects is the best use, None of these are "Feel good" projects, they are all projects that will have an impact to the residents of Bar Harbor.
As for paying for things not voted on, That's exactly why this is going on the November ballot, to be voted on. We cannot just spend the money without voter approval in November.
I know this Matt I just wish I could go back the days of my childhood when this was a town where everyone knew everyone, and life was simpler. I remember when the whole town and all the tourist turned out for the QE2’s first visit. Little did we know then our future.