Working to find a solution to how to finance the building of the new jail for Ringgold county was the focus of meetings of the Ringgold county board of supervisors this past week.
It looks like financing the project though a lease-purchase agreement has fallen through with the firm working on the project not able to meet all the specifications of Bob Josten, attorney for the financing of the project that the board has been using.
That leaves going back to financing the project with general revenue bonds which would still be paid for from the proceeds of the one-cent sales tax voters approved for the project by over a 70 percent majority three years ago.
Using the bond method, however, will mean that the project will need to go back to be bid on in an open bidding process and the board has been working with Joe Murphy and Kelly Richards, who they had given the nod to move ahead with plans for a lease-purchase project, to get the details worked out on changing the financing.
Meanwhile a group of county residents have brought a petition seeking another vote on whether to move forward with the jail project.
Bob Josten from Dorsey and Whitney in Des Moines had an answer for the petition that has been turned in to the supervisors seeking another vote on the issue. He also was on a telephone conference call during the board meetings Thursday, June 10 and Tuesday, June 15.
“I have reviewed the form of petition that was filed with the county auditor, and I want to assure the board and everyone else that there is no basis in state law for this petition and it has no legal effect on any of the current discussions,” Josten wrote to the board.
In July 2007 the board published a notice of hearing on its intent to issue general obligation local option sales tax bonds and the notice included language that notified voters that they had the right to file a petition requesting a referendum, he wrote. No petition was filed in the statutory time limit.
Then in August 2008 the board published a notice of hearing on its intent to enter into a lease-purchase agreement, payable from the county’s general fund including the local option sales tax revenues. Again no petition was filed within the statutory limit.
“Therefore it is our opinion as bond counsel to the county that the board has legal authority to incur debt for the jail project by either issuing General Obligation local option sales tax bonds or by entering into a general fund lease-purchase agreement, using local option tax revenues as a source of payment, without publishing any other notices,” he wrote. “The result is that there is no context within which a valid petition may be filed requesting action by the board.”
In the last two board meetings, the board has worked to try to determine the steps in changing the financing back to the general obligation bonds.
The plan is for the supervisors to purchase the current plans for the project from Murphy and then to go to bid on the construction costs for getting the jail built.