Supervisors award loan to provide demolition funds

A loan agreement to provide funds for the demolition of the former Jasper County Care Facility was awarded to Community State Bank on Tuesday. The Jasper County Board of Supervisors approved the bank’s low bid of 1.5 percent interest for a three year note.

Three bids were presented for a loan that is not to exceed $400,000. First State Bank of Lynnville presented a bid of 2.1 percent for a three year loan and 3.1 percent for a five-year loan. Bank Iowa of Newton submitted bids of 2.25 percent and 2.5 percent for the three and five year notes. Community State Bank also bid 2 percent for a five-year loan, though the county was confident it could accept the three-year interest rate.

“The nice thing about this is we don’t have raise the debt to cover this because we just finished paying off another note for work on the courthouse,” supervisor Dennis Stevenson said.

Lanphier Excavating was awarded the project at $297,500 in March. Demolition work at the property started on May 16 and is estimated to take two months.

The board also approved a request from the Newton Fest Committee for the use of the courthouse lawn during the event on June 11.

“We are hosting events uptown again this year around the square. We have the chamber of commerce car show, retailers will be open and we have a street dance planned that night,” co-chair Nathan Unsworth said.

He said the lawn will mostly be used as a staging area for vendors and for a bags tournament that is planned.

“We’re also looking to host a Chalk the Walk event with Buena Vista University. We are hoping to give a portion of the sidewalks along the perimeter of the courthouse to business to decorate as they see fit and the top art will get an award from BVU,” Unsworth said.

In other business:

• A new Bobcat skid loader was approved for purchase at $64,170.

• Ralph McGregor of Reasnor was appointed to the compensation commission.

Contact Jamee A. Pierson
at 641-792-3121 ext. 6534
or jpierson@newtondailynews.com