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> Career Center referendum has failed by 2:1 margin
Southsider2k12
post Jan 28 2009, 01:42 PM
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http://thenewsdispatch.com/main.asp?Sectio...amp;TM=52712.52

QUOTE
Career center in the hands of voters

Deborah Sederberg
The News-Dispatch

MICHIGAN CITY - It could be June before voters decide whether to build a new 150,000-square-foot career and technical center adjacent to Michigan City High School.

After the board of the Michigan City Area Schools agreed to build the center, retired restaurant owner Charles Morgan took on a petition drive to bring the matter to the voters via referendum. Morgan presented the petitions with 125 signatures to the Board of Voter Registration, which verified the registered voters and sent it on to the auditor, who has the task of verifying property owners. According to La Porte County Auditor Craig Hinchman, the petitions arrived in his office on Wednesday. He has 10 business days to certify the property owner signers. "We'll be checking deeds," he said.

Registered voters residing within the school district and those who own property within the district but do not reside here were eligible to sign the petition.

When the referendum is presented on a ballot, however, only registered voters living within the MCAS boundaries will be eligible to vote.

When Hinchman certifies the property owners, he will forward the matter to the Board of Elections, which will bring the referendum to the voters within 90 to 120 days of the time the board receives the petitions and signatures.

At this time, the board of elections has only two members - Republican attorney Ralph Howes, La Porte, and Bette Conroy, who, by virtue of her position as county clerk, serves as secretary. The third member, Democrat attorney Gary Davis, has resigned, Conroy said. "And I haven't heard from the Democrats about a replacement."

Because this is not an election year, the fate of the proposed career center will be decided at a special election, Conroy noted.

"At this point, I have no idea" about how much a special election might cost, she added.

She will propose that the 35 precincts within the MCAS district be consolidated into just a few locations, but the Board of Elections will make the decision.

She hopes to save money by cutting down on personnel for the election. For example, since this is a non-partisan election, she said, "We won't need to have inspectors from each party. The election board could decide to have just one inspector. According to state law, in La Porte County that inspector would be a Democrat because La Porte County voted for the Democrat secretary of state.

She will suggest using just two judges and four clerks for the election.

Conroy hasn't yet heard how Porter County will run the special election in Pine Township because she understands Porter County will have another matter to add to the ballot.

No one from Porter County government was available to comment on the matter.
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kharris
post Jan 28 2009, 04:32 PM
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QUOTE(southsider2k9 @ Jan 28 2009, 01:42 PM) *

Let's hope the voters think before they cast a vote on this one. I am not opposed to the concept, but why do we want to place a $70 million burden on the taxpayers when a rehab of the AK Smith center could be done for a much smaller price tag. It could then be evaluated as to how the project is working with students and have time to build the curriculum to suit the concept. These economic times are NOT the time to be asking the taxpayers to foot the bill on a $70 million project. Kudos to Charlie for organizing the petitions.
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Ang
post Jan 28 2009, 04:38 PM
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I think the whole issue stems from the fact that they have to bus kids from MCHS to AKS & back and they are trying to avoid that.


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kharris
post Jan 28 2009, 05:19 PM
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QUOTE(Ang @ Jan 28 2009, 04:38 PM) *

I think the whole issue stems from the fact that they have to bus kids from MCHS to AKS & back and they are trying to avoid that.

Still not a reason to burden the taxpayer with a $70 million price tag
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Michelle
post Jan 28 2009, 06:45 PM
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It would be great if one of the radio stations or the paper could organize a panel of people for/against this concept leading up to the referendum. I'm such a fan of career/technical education, but the price of this seems so high. More information would be welcome.
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eric.hanke
post Jan 28 2009, 07:35 PM
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The MCAS Administration has spent thousands of dollars on trips to other Tech Ed Facilities all over the country and have yet to assemble a complete plan for the MCAS Tech Center.



I equate it to building a restaurant without knowing what kind of food you are going to serve.



I support a Tech Center, but we need a complete plan before spending money, especially 10's of millions of dollars.



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Ang
post Jan 29 2009, 10:20 AM
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QUOTE(kharris @ Jan 28 2009, 04:19 PM) *

Still not a reason to burden the taxpayer with a $70 million price tag

I completely agree!


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Southsider2k12
post Jan 29 2009, 10:30 AM
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Personally I am really torn on this one. First and foremost, it is a great recognition of the demographics of the children of Michigan City that we need something like this. We are churning out so many kids who are not ready for the workforce, a place like this could mean a lifetime of work to many kids. There is no doubt this is the single biggest capital expense we need as a community school system.

The rub is this. We have built two brand new schools in the last couple of years. That is a large bond issue. I can't remember the cost off of the top of my head, but it is in the eight digit dollar range. We are now talking about adding $70,000,000 in debt to a community with a shrinking tax base, and a group that now has an artificial cap on how quickly it can grow revenue because of the property tax caps. Can Michigan City afford this, and secondly should they have to pay for this with the economy in the state it is in? We are talking about the worse economy for decades. That is a bad time to be asking people for money.

Finally, this is an even worse time to be looking to float a $70 million municipal bond issue. With the community profile that City has, it is going to be difficult to get a good enough rating to keep interest rates low. It is going to be even harder to find investors who have this kind of money to spare who are wanting to buy our bond issue.
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Roger Kaputnik
post Jan 29 2009, 11:28 AM
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I think there is some discussion of this, maybe on the MCAS thread.

At any rate, I am not clear on what the referendum question is. I have heard that it is whether to build it or not or whether the bonds will be paid for within the prop tax cap or in addition to the the cap. T

Anyone know?

What other choices are there? The Board seems like the only body that can stop this project. I personally do not have enough info to decide whether this is a good thing or not--like I said, this has been presented as a false dichotomy, and that is a major disservice to the kids.


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kharris
post Jan 29 2009, 12:19 PM
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QUOTE(Roger Kaputnik @ Jan 29 2009, 11:28 AM) *

I think there is some discussion of this, maybe on the MCAS thread.

At any rate, I am not clear on what the referendum question is. I have heard that it is whether to build it or not or whether the bonds will be paid for within the prop tax cap or in addition to the the cap. T

Anyone know?

What other choices are there? The Board seems like the only body that can stop this project. I personally do not have enough info to decide whether this is a good thing or not--like I said, this has been presented as a false dichotomy, and that is a major disservice to the kids.


At this point, the voters are the body that can stop this project. Don't know just how the question will read but I will see if I can find that out and then post it here.
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kharris
post Jan 29 2009, 12:25 PM
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QUOTE(kharris @ Jan 29 2009, 12:19 PM) *

At this point, the voters are the body that can stop this project. Don't know just how the question will read but I will see if I can find that out and then post it here.

It is the county auditor that will put the verbage together and then give it to the clerk. The clerk's office is expecting to have that on Monday. When she does receive it she will pass it on to me and I will in turn post it here.
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Roger Kaputnik
post Jan 29 2009, 01:40 PM
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QUOTE(kharris @ Jan 29 2009, 12:19 PM) *

At this point, the voters are the body that can stop this project. Don't know just how the question will read but I will see if I can find that out and then post it here.


I mean that the referendum is not about the go/no-go decision; it is only about the bond payment and the prop tax cap. Any school board members care to publish the motions passed to get to this point?


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eric.hanke
post Jan 29 2009, 02:19 PM
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QUOTE(Roger Kaputnik @ Jan 29 2009, 01:40 PM) *


I mean that the referendum is not about the go/no-go decision; it is only about the bond payment and the prop tax cap. Any school board members care to publish the motions passed to get to this point?




While I am not a School Board member I can certanly answer Roger's question.



The only motion required is to approve a 1028 Resolution based on the cost of the project for the bond issue. The 1028 hearing was at the MCAS Administration Building on December 16, 2008 at 5PM. The Title of the Meeting Read:

QUOTE

A 1028 Hearing on Proposed A.K. Smith Career Center by the Board of School Trustees of the Michigan City Area Schools convened at 5:00 p.m. in the Board Room of the Administration Building, 408 S. Carroll Avenue, Michigan City, Indiana, pursuant to notice duly given all members.



The vote carried 6-1 with Mr. Burgwald voting no.


There have been other motions brought to the table and passed regarding fesability studies.





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Southsider2k12
post Feb 2 2009, 09:52 AM
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So working in the financial sector for 10 years, I learned how little I really know about bond issues the other day. I talked to my companies expert in bond trading, and he actually gave me some interesting info. I was wrong on there not being much interest in muni's right now. There is actually heightened interest, because many people are looking for places that have interest income. With the Fed's target rate near zero, it is hard to find a place to make money right now. The big thing is that the municipality has to have a solid credit rating. I would be very interested to see what our rating was of our last two bond issues, and how much affect those two issues have on us trying to look for another $70,000,000.
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eric.hanke
post Feb 2 2009, 10:25 AM
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QUOTE(southsider2k9 @ Feb 2 2009, 09:52 AM) *
So working in the financial sector for 10 years, I learned how little I really know about bond issues the other day. I talked to my companies expert in bond trading, and he actually gave me some interesting info. I was wrong on there not being much interest in muni's right now. There is actually heightened interest, because many people are looking for places that have interest income. With the Fed's target rate near zero, it is hard to find a place to make money right now. The big thing is that the municipality has to have a solid credit rating. I would be very interested to see what our rating was of our last two bond issues, and how much affect those two issues have on us trying to look for another $70,000,000.




I have an open dialog with Theo Boone, the MCAS CFO, and can ask. So I don't sound like a complete moron can you ask your friend for some common jargon?



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Southsider2k12
post Feb 2 2009, 10:29 AM
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QUOTE(eric.hanke @ Feb 2 2009, 10:25 AM) *

I have an open dialog with Theo Boone, the MCAS CFO, and can ask. So I don't sound like a complete moron can you ask your friend for some common jargon?


Ask him what our rating was for the bond issues dealing with the two new elementary schools. I don't think they could find out the new rating until they started the process of finding underwriters for the career center issue.
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eric.hanke
post Feb 2 2009, 10:32 AM
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QUOTE(southsider2k9 @ Feb 2 2009, 10:29 AM) *


Ask him what our rating was for the bond issues dealing with the two new elementary schools. I don't think they could find out the new rating until they started the process of finding underwriters for the career center issue.




The rating is a number similar to consumer credit ratings? If so, is the scale the same (IE 800 good, 600 bad)?


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Southsider2k12
post Feb 2 2009, 10:42 AM
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QUOTE(eric.hanke @ Feb 2 2009, 10:32 AM) *

The rating is a number similar to consumer credit ratings? If so, is the scale the same (IE 800 good, 600 bad)?


It is the same idea, but it is lettered and numbers. AAA is the highest, then comes AA, and A. Then it goes into B's and C's, then some others.
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eric.hanke
post Feb 2 2009, 10:46 AM
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QUOTE(southsider2k9 @ Feb 2 2009, 10:42 AM) *


It is the same idea, but it is lettered and numbers. AAA is the highest, then comes AA, and A. Then it goes into B's and C's, then some others.




Thanks! I will find out and update the thread.



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eric.hanke
post Feb 2 2009, 02:48 PM
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QUOTE( E-Mail From Theo Boone, Jr. @ Feb 2 2009, 11:43 AM) *


Mr. Hanke:
As of August, 2008 the MCAS S&P Bond Rating was "AA+" one
of the best rating in the state.

Theo Boone, Jr.





Enjoy!!!



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