SALEM Bonds to fund community center

Although the city is issuing bonds, it incurs no financial obligation by doing so.
By NORMAN LEIGH
VINDICATOR SALEM BUREAU
SALEM -- The city is helping to lay the financial foundation for a proposed community center.
City council agreed Tuesday to issue $9.5 million in bonds to finance construction of the facility on a nearly 10-acre site along North Ellsworth Avenue near 12th Street.
Although the city is issuing the bonds, it simply is serving as a conduit for the loan, explained Councilwoman Nancy Cope, R-at-large, chairwoman of council's finance committee.
"This is of no cost to the city," Cope said of the 25-year, variable interest loan.
Obligated to pay back the loan is the Salem Community Center Inc., the group overseeing construction and the eventual operation of the nonprofit center.
Plans nearing completion: Early estimates projected the facility's cost at about $8 million. But now that plans for the nearly 50,000-square-foot, two-story facility are being finalized, projections call for it to cost about $9.5 million.
Underwriting the expense of the project is the Salem Community Foundation, a charitable organization that gives money to many community projects and agencies.
Plans call for groundbreaking on the center to occur sometime in April. Construction will take about 14 months and will entail razing four homes that stand on the community center site. The center will include a gym, running track, teen and community lounges, indoor pool, exercise area, meeting rooms and an arts and craft area.
The community foundation has spent the last several weeks searching for a full-time administrator for the facility. Organizers are trying to have someone hired in time for the center's groundbreaking.