At its August 10 regular meeting, the Greenbelt City Council gave final approval to a proposed refinancing of two prior bond issues. In addition, it received a briefing on the environmental assessment of the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC).
Refinancing
As reported in Matt Arbach’s story in the August 13 News Review, the current extremely low interest rates provide an opportunity to obtain lower rates on two city bonds: the 2011 bonds used to cover the shortfall in the 2001 bond fund ($1.8 million) and the 2013 bonds ($2.3 million) covering the city’s unfunded liability to the state retirement system. The maturity date of the new bonds will be identical to the existing maturities, according to Senior Vice President Joe Mason of Davenport and Company, the city’s financial advisor.
The two best offers came from Freedom Bank and JP Morgan Chase. Freedom Bank had the lowest rate for refinancing the 2011 bonds. For the 2013 bonds, Chase had a slightly lower rate (1.313 percent vs. Freedom’s 1.4 percent) but did not offer a uniform savings option.
Council had two decisions to make. First, which bank(s) to award the refinancing and second, whether to take all the savings up front or to spread the savings over the period covered by the loans (uniform savings). Council accepted the staff recommendation that the city should select the uniform savings option.
On successive unanimous votes, council awarded both bond refinancing agreements to Freedom Bank.
Refinancing the bonds will save the city roughly $700,000. The refunding bonds will be retained by the bank and not offered to the public. Jennifer
Diercksen, Davenport first vice president, described the legal requirements for refinancing through a public bond issue, which are numerous and time consuming.
Goddard Assessment
Council unanimously directed the Department of Planning and Community Development to send a letter to GSFC requesting that the issues identified by staff be considered in the upcoming environmental and historic assessment of its 20-year master plan.
Implementation of the plan is subject to the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act. In concordance with these requirements, GSFC is now soliciting comments on the scope of the environmental assessment.
The solicitation letter notes that the master plan calls for the demolition, construction and renovation of numerous buildings, along with general infrastructure maintenance and improvement activities. Further, NASA would explore options for some excess buildings and land areas, including “divesting land, divesting buildings and potential future partnerships with non-NASA entities.” Full implementation of the master plan is expected to result in the demolition of excess or energy-inefficient buildings, reducing the site’s building footprint by approximately 645,000 square feet. Divestment of excess buildings would further reduce the footprint by 100,000 square feet. New construction of energy-efficient buildings would increase the footprint by 363,000 square feet. The draft environmental assessment is expected to be released in January 2021.
In a memorandum, Terri Hruby, director of the city’s Department of Planning and Community Development, stated that the scoping agreement should address impacts on the natural environment, water quality, transportation (impacts on local roads, transit, bicycle and pedestrian movements), electric vehicle charging stations, light, noise, air quality and socioeconomics. It must also, she wrote, address environmental mitigation efforts and sustainability.
The impact of the plan on the GSFC Historic District must also be studied, including historic resources and historically significant archeological sites, and identifying buildings that may be eligible for National Register designation.
Staff and council were concerned about the references to divesting of land and buildings. Councilmember Judith Davis pointed out that the wooded sections of the GSFC campus are part of a green belt that she feared would become a cash cow for the federal government. That also concerned Councilmember Rodney Roberts, who was also concerned about the divested property being given to other federal agencies.
Hruby and her staff will relay these concerns to GSFC and ask that the city be kept continuously updated.