Bond refinancing expected to save more than $475,000

PORT EWEN, N.Y. >> Town Board members expect to save $476,629 by refinancing the remaining $2.16 million of the $3 million in 30-year bonds that were taken out in 2006 to pay for construction of the Town Hall.

Details of the refunding were part of a report issued last week. The report said there will be a 3.92 percent interest rate for the new bonds paid over the next 18 years. The old bonds had an interest rate of 4.49 percent.

Supervisor Shannon Harris credited an improvement in the town’s S&P Global credit rating from an A to AA- as one of the reasons town officials were able to get a reduction the long-term debt.

“If we didn’t have that rating, we wouldn’t have gotten such a good interest rate,” she said.

Harrisadded that the credit rating improved after the town was approved for a $2.24 million grant to pay for the Port Ewen Water District tank.

“If we hadn’t gotten that grant for the water tank, we wouldn’t have gotten that rating,” she said. “That all factors in, whether the town has plans to go to bond again or a major project on the horizon. It all plays into the ratings.”

The bonds were eligible to be refinanced three years ago, but interest charges were above the rate considered to be favorable for achieving at least $20,000 per year in savings.

Town Hall construction began in 2007 after five years of planning and two rounds of bidding before the costs was put at $5.23 million for the 17,800-square-foot building off of U.S. Route 9W.

State Department of Transportation funding covered $2.6 million of the project as part of an agreement for moving out of the former Town Hall on Route 9W and Salem Street so it could be demolished for a road-widening project. The area of that property that was not used for the state project was converted to a small parking lot and a memorial park with a bronze statue of abolitionist Sojourner Truth.

Town offices had previously been in a 7,600-square-foot building that was formerly a restaurant and car dealership. It had been purchased for $12,000 in 1946 from the Spinnenweber family. In 2005, the family also sold the 21-acre property on which the current Town Hall is located to Esopus for $210,000.