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SLO issuing $8.3 million highway interchange bond

September 18, 2014

sloThe city of San Luis Obispo will issue $8.3 million in lease revenue bonds to secure the final funding needed to widen a busy interchange at the edge of town.

Plans have been in the works for more than a decade to expand the Highway 101/Los Osos Valley Road Interchange in San Luis Obispo. Traffic frequently backs up at the location, and the city is soon to break ground on a project that will widen Los Osos Valley Road to four lanes between South Higuera Street and the Calle Joaquin intersection.

The project will cost an estimated $33 million. The city has secured a $16 million state grant for the project, but has been struggling to raise enough funding to finalize plans.

Following approval from the city council on Tuesday, city staff will now use a downtown parking structure and two fire stations to secure the lease revenue bonds.

Finance Director Wayne Padilla says the bond revenue will provide the city with the final funding needed for the project. Other funding will come from impact fees and additional assessments paid by businesses, like Costco, Home Depot and Target, which operate in the area.


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Why anyone would trust the Management/Council for the City of SLO is far beyond me.


We have a council majority that has been appointed/elected/supported by the Democratic Central Committee and that in itself should speak volumes. They also support Bruce Gibson, Adam Hill, Caren Hill and all the immoral, perverts in this County.


We have Jan Marx, campaign/financial manager behind the Dalidio Farm Controversy on Madonna Rd whereby the fair hair Copeland Bros were fined for deceit, corruption, and harm to this project. We also have the City of SLO, Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Association, Madonna Enterprises instilling harm all the while Madonna is going full speed ahead developing Costco, Home Depot, and all the other projects on Los Osos Valley Road.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalidio_Ranch_Project_Controversy


And the SLO Citizens trust and believe that the City is going to build out that overpass, roadway, etc. for $33 million, really!


“The project will cost an estimated $33 million.” The keyword here is ESTIMATED! This whole project will cost over $100 million if you are lucky. Just look what it cost to pave a street!


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They estimate $33,000,000 for this? I would be SHOCKED if they can keep it under $100 million. There is no way the government can keep this project close to $33M.


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Let them eat cake.


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So the City is issuing an $8.3 million bond when they have nearly a $100 million in a slush fund. Wow, lets create a huge debt for the community that is not warranted. Next, they will float a bond to cover huge salary increases.


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Given the level of pension obligations they have allowed, they may well need that slush fund in the future. However, given their general level of fiscal mismanagement, it probably won’t last long enough for that either so you have a point.


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A few years back we got this on high-paid local civil servants:


“A list of the 50 top-paid city employees for the last two fiscal years in San Luis Obispo shows that about 85 percent are firefighters and police officers — many of them pushed there by overtime pay. The rest are top managers.


“In 2009-10, the salary range of the 50 top-paid employees was $123,697 to $160,394. In 2008-09 the range was $123,366 to $191,911. All figures included overtime costs but excluded other compensation, such as contributions to health and pension plans.”


Read more here: http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2010/11/06/1359447_highest-paid-employees-in-slo.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy


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Why mess around with stats that are 5 years old. A more recent version is here:


http://transparentcalifornia.com/salaries/san-luis-obispo/


It shows, if my quick count is right, we have 158 city employees making $100K or more. It tells exactly who they are and how much they make. That’s one of them for every 178 of us in a town where median household income is in the $50sK!


Far too much pay for people who aren’t in the least remarkable. Hey, when a firefighter a couple years out of training can make over $100K, isn’t something wrong with that picture? Why do we do this?


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So what about the Dalidio property developer? That project is what will generate impossible traffic. I thought the developer was supposed to provide considerable funding for traffic mitigation, a Prado Road overpass, which would relieve the the pressure from the LOVR overpass.


The city got, what, $40 million plus over the years from the measure ‘Y” tax, and what did they do with it? Pay increases, golden pensions and the hiring of a grossly overpaid elitist City Manager that does not live in the city, not even in the county; she deigns to show up in our town once a week for the council meeting. A parasite! And then there is the $750,000 spent to cutsie up two blocks of downtown, and of course pay raises for our useless city attorney (another parasite).


Vote no on “G”!


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Deals will be struck with Grossman just like the Madonna’s when they developed Home Depot, Costco, etc..


AND NOW WE ALL KNOW WHY CLINT PIERCE/MADONNA ENTERPRISES IS LEADING THE SUPPORT FOR MEASURE G – SO THEY CAN DEVELOP THE REST OF LOS OSOS VALLEY ROAD.


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And get developer welfare while doing it! Anybody following the city’s subsidies to developers like Pearce? The whole thing stinks. Not long ago there was something weird on the council agenda about the city paying him $million to abandon a sewer pump station that served only the Madonna Inn. That’s a lot of hush money — he’d lawyered up, and that’s why they gave him the loot. Oh well, that comes from our sewer bills, which will doubtless go up to cover the gift.


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Most of the bonds will be purchased by the Madonna gang, including Clint Pearce. They will earn a nice 4-5% tax free, they will encourage us to pass measure G to pay the bonds back, and they will then get to build more stores on lovr to expand their empire. Government is the greatest producer of wealth ever created, you just have to know how to use it properly. IMHO


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4-5% is not that great of a return.


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It is compared to what us common folk are getting, less than 1%, plus having to pay the bonds back plus interest so we are really just going in the hole quicker


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So tell where to get a greater return net of income tax. Maybe I should call Al Moriarty or Karen Guth?


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They’re tax free muni bonds, so that comes out to a lot more than the face value.


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“Struggling to raise enough money to finalize plans”? What about the Measure Y money for infrastructure? What about all those fees that are sitting in the city’s bank account making .02% interest? Yes, Yes! Let’s take on more bonded indebtedness. Measure G if passed will provide the bondholders with a secure source of money to repay the bonds.


Moreover the city wants to make a Joint Powers Agreement with the city and the city’s Parking Authority to get the bonds -which means this indebtedness won’t show up on the the city’s balance sheet. Way to go to defraud us! Check out the Sept. 2 city council agenda for the details.


Vote NO on Measure G and get rid of the incompetent management and leadership at city hall or we will never see the end of it.


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“Struggling to raise enough money to finalize plans”? How about cutting salaries, benefits and pensions, could probably make up the needed money in less than an year, especially if cuts were made to the city manger and APCD manager


Yes I know Larry Allen’s 300k $$$$ or so is a county thing but it is still wrong


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Oy, can you imagine the traffic situation in and around that vicinity during the construction project? And not a whole lot of route alternatives to choose from.


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