WEST MIDDLESEX School board OKs refinancing of loan through sale of bonds

The loan was to help pay for renovations to the high school.
WEST MIDDLESEX, Pa. -- The West Middlesex Area School Board hopes to save $365,000 in interest costs by refinancing an old loan taken out through the sale of bonds.
The board voted Tuesday to refinance what's left of a $10 million bond issue. The money was borrowed in 1993 to help finance the renovation of the high school.
Superintendent Albert Jones said the bond market interest rate has improved to the point that the district can sell the remaining bonds at a substantial savings, generating an estimated $365,000 in "up front" interest savings.
That means the school district will get that money immediately.
Uses for money: It will be used to do more improvement work at the Oakview Elementary School, which is in the midst of an $8 million renovation; some of the money will go toward some roof repairs at the high school that weren't part of that building's renovation project, Jones said.
The district has already paid off nearly half of the 1993 bond issue and the new issue will total $5,606,647, Jones said. Of that amount, $5,230,000 is from the old bond issue and the rest is the cost of refinancing.
Jones didn't know the interest rate on either the 1993 bonds or the new ones. The district's bond counsel in Pittsburgh couldn't be reached.
The board did a similar refinancing package on a $10 million bond issue borrowed in 1994, also for the high school project.
The district had paid off a large chunk of that issue as well and sold the remaining $5 million at a lower interest rate in 1997, saving $145,000 in interest costs.