The Newton School Board received nine bids on the second sale of School Infrastructure Sales, Services and Use Tax Revenue Bonds to pay for the $22 million building additions and renovations at Aurora Heights and Thomas Jefferson elementary schools on Monday. 

During a special meeting Monday night, school board members approved the low true interest rate bid of 3.7799% from Keybanc Capital Markets in Cleveland, Ohio. The 15-year payback on up to $13,750,000 in bonds will cost the Newton School District a total of $14,449,772. Newton School District Director of Business Services Tim Bloom says the money from the $9.5 million bond sale a year ago has now been spent. By having two bond sales, Bloom notes that the district avoided paying interest on the entire borrowed amount from the start of the projects. He adds that both are currently on budget.

“Yes, we are doing really well on the projects. We had some things come in that were unexpected, but right now we are still under our contingency amounts. So we are doing really well with that.”

Bloom says the interest rate on the first bond sale was 3.22%. Hear more from Bloom about Monday’s bond sale on today’s Let’s Talk Newton.