The Ridgewood Blog Brings a Free Market Laissez-faire Point of View to Local, New Jersey State and National Issues.
Photos and Post courtesy of Steve Kim
Ridgewood NJ, according to Steve Kim on the Facebook page It Takes a Ridgewood Village, “These are the details of a long-dated Ridgewood BOE Bond: 2035 maturity/2027 call
Continue reading It is Essential to have the Ridgewood School Budget Vote
file photo by Boyd Loving
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood families are going to have to start making choices between food on the table, gasoline and property taxes.
Here’s the data from the recently adopted 2018 Municipal budget: (https://www.ridgewoodnj.net/images/User_Friendly_Budget_2018.pdf )
Village net debt is now $50.1 mm BEFORE the garage and further property investment. Interest costs are rising, so that will act as a further drag on spending as more of the budget goes towards interest expenses on our debt going forward.
Continue reading Raising Rates Call Into Question Village Debt
photo by Boyd Loving
Fedruary 6,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, the purpose of the garage from the very beginning seems to have been to build a commuter garage for NJT and Bergen County in Ridgewood ,moving to make the Village a transit hub
The Village of Ridgewood (the “Village”) is undertaking the construction of an $11.7M parking deck on Hudson Street (the “Project”). There are two ways the Village can finance this Project over a 25 year period. First, the Village can issue its own General Obligation Bonds (the “Village Bonds”). Second, the Village can finance the project through the Bergen County Improvement Authority (the “BCIA”), which would issue County of Bergen Guaranteed Lease Revenue Bonds (the “BCIA Bonds”). In either event, the Village will be responsible to pay 100% of the debt service on whichever bonds are issued. (https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/manager/hudson/20160129BCIAFin.pdf )
the choice :
Transaction Costs: The model includes up-front fixed costs of issuance of $162,500 for the BCIA Bonds vs. $92,500 for the Village Bonds. These costs include typical municipal bond transaction fees such as bond counsel, financial advisor, auditor, credit rating agency, printing, etc. In addition, the analysis assumes the underwriter’s discount would be essentially the same under either scenario. The BCIA Bonds also include the upfront authority financing fee of 12.5 basis points (“bps”) of total par amount of BCIA Bonds, the annual authority administration fee of 5 bps based on the annual outstanding par amount of the BCIA Bonds and an annual trustee fee of $1,000. (https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/manager/hudson/20160129BCIAFin.pdf )
as per usually the most expensive for Village Taxpayers is the best choice .
Going to the BCIA , once the money is approved, it tends to appear almost instantaneously, accruing interest long before the project can even get started. That is a significant reason to reconsider this plan or ploy and an excellent reason, if it does happen, not to ask for a cent more than is needed. But losing control over the way commuter spaces are priced is a huge problem and there are undoubtedly more.
There will be approximately 320 car garage. 4 levels. The mayor said in the last meeting that 2 levels may be dedicated to commuters. That’s about 160 cars for commuters. We currently already have one level, which is mostly used by Ridgewood commuters. Lets say the second level is used by Bergen County commuters at no extra money compared to Ridgewood commuters. So, 2 levels are either used by out of Ridgewood commuters or commuters who are already using this lot today without the garage.
With remaining 2 levels, we will get 160 new spot, presumably for non commuters. Cost – 12.3 million in new bond, 500K bond has been already spent + 450k already spent on environmental studies in 2014 & 2015 on this lot. = 13.25M.
That’s 82,800 for every new parking spot created for CBD. This assumes that the project will not go over the budget. With the way this council and village manager are spending the money, this is highly unlikely to stay in the budget.
2015 Walker Feasibility Study for Garage
INCREASING REVENUE Given that the new demand stream is not anticipated to cover debt service for the garage, the parking system will need to increase revenue on existing spaces if it is to be self-supporting.
There will be a natural uptick in revenue as Parkmobile becomes more utilized. Apps of this sort increase compliance and also disallow “piggybacking” onto a previous parker’s leftover meter time. We have increased revenue in 2015 and 2016 to account for Parkmobile’s impact. While a 15 percent increase is common, we are projecting a five percent increase. Extending meter hours and enforcement until 9 pm is the first recommended step. Since daytime retail and restaurant customers pay to park, it is fair to ask evening restaurant customers to pay as well. In addition, metering the streets in the evening can provide parking management solutions to crowding in the future, should the Village wish to reduce employee parking along streets that should be available to customers.
Evening rates alone will not cover the projected debt service; it will be necessary to increase rates as well. In order to achieve a debt service coverage ratio of 1.5, our projections assume the following:
