School board approves $10 million bond sale

The Newton Community School District Board of Education was busy reviewing and approving numbers and figures at Monday’s meeting.

A presentation of fiscal year 2016’s audit was provided by certified public accountant Mike Stanley of Hunt and Associates. Stanley does not foresee any problems popping up for the district.

“I would say that as long as you keep a steady course, you’re going to keep the district in a good, healthy financial condition,” Stanley said.

Newton did a fine job of turning its nutrition fund around in 2016, considering the deficit of the previous year, Stanley said.

Regarding the activities fund, the accountant did note one area that needs to be addressed. There were funds collected by the wrestling and basketball programs in December and January that were not turned in or deposited until April. It is in the district’s best interest to turn those funds in as soon as possible, he said.

Also at Monday’s meeting were Jen Smith and Susanne Gerlach of Public Financial Management to go over the bids on a bond of $10 million for the new Berg Middle School. There were six bids for the project, and the winning bidder was Citigroup Global Markets, Inc., Smith said. The board approved the bond sale.

The Denver, Colo.-based Citigroup provided a true interest rate of 2.8 percent over the 20-year bond, which is a tremendous rate, Gerlach said. This bond sale is the second of four phases of borrowing for the Berg project. Citigroup also purchased the first bond for the district last fall.

Superintendent Bob Callaghan said the district appreciates the time and effort put in by Smith and Gerlach.

“The support we’ve gotten from Susanne and Jen over the last four months has been phenomenal,” Callaghan said. “We speak frequently, and they’re great ladies to work with.”

During the superintendent’s report, the district’s maintenance, technology and transportation supervisors delivered reports. Maintenance Supervisor Jack Suttek said there are roofing projects at Woodrow Wilson and Emerson Hough scheduled for the summer. Also during the summer, the high school will undergo a heating and cooling project and touch ups to the parking lot.

Board President Travis Padget asked Suttek about how the new Berg Middle School will impact the maintenance budget. Suttek said to expect big number changes.

“As we’ve all known since day one — 50 percent of our time is spent in (Berg),” Suttek said. “That’s a rough estimate. I foresee a lot of maintenance money going down because that building nickels and dimes us.”

Technology Supervisor Dan Sloan said the high school will upgrade its iPads this year. The current tablets are four years old and are starting to fail, Sloan said. Some of the older iPads will be saved as reserve units.

Supervisor Curt Roorda gave the update for the district’s transportation department. He said the buses will be moved to the south side of Berg next year to better accommodate the student population of more than 500 in the busy afternoons.

Contact Justin Jagler at 641-792-3121 ext 6532 or jjagler@newtondailynews.com