special calls meeting in the Belton City Council April 29th, 2025 530 Kim Wright Repair Center. There we go. Good evening. Hurry up. What a beautiful day. It's always nice to see I-35 shut down to one or two lanes so everything backs up to downtown Belton and people get to experience what Belton's like. A parking lot. I think I run into people all over the state and they'll tell them where I'm from. They're like, oh, you're the place where they have that random traffic jam. Yeah. It's like, we never can't figure out why it's there, but it's always there. So, you know, welcome. It's Tuesday, April, between 9th, it's a special call meeting. I'm going to call this meeting to order. It didn't even show. Anyway, so we're going to start with a pledge of allegiance led by Mayor Pro Tem, John Holmes. Texas Pledge will be led by Director of Communications Paul Romer. There. There. There we go. I'll see you now. All right. And then invocation will be by Dave Cummington. Please rise. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. We'll call the rev. One nation are gone, individual with liberty and justice for all. I know the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the Texas one state under God and indivisible. You bow with me. Father, we love you. We thank you so much for how you take care of us and provide for us and protect us. We thank you for what an honor and privilege it is to live in Belson and to be a part of such a great community. I ask that you give us wisdom tonight as we consider the business of the city. And I thank you especially for Councilman Carpenter and what love he has for our town. Wayne has been such an inspiration to me and to many of us and we just appreciate you planning in here in Belton and for giving him such a hard-to-service community and giving back. It's been an honor to serve with him and to look up to him for many years and we just pray blessings for him and the end of the future. We thank you most of all for your son Jesus and his name we pray. Amen. Amen. Now we'll call it officially in order at 5.33pm Tuesday April 29th. We want to thank you for being the first item on our agenda as public comments. If anyone wishes to address the council, they may do so. Positive or negative things, just limit your profanity and limit the time to three minutes. And so anyone who wishes to approach, give us your address so we know the booths at it. So anyone wish to say anything? There's like a little, your profanity, your reminets? Yeah, limit your profanity. Reminets. Yeah. All right, I'll take a second. We're gonna talk about a little bit later, but I wanted to say thank you to Wayne for serving all the years in public service through the schools and through the council. You've been a stabilizing force for the community and for us. You've always thought about us and we, more than me. And so that is something that is very rare in this world. And so thank you for doing that. I didn't get to know Wayne, but I learned about Wayne. And I don't know who bought or sold the Alfa Romeo green convertible back in the 1980s to Ed Thomas. No, if you sold it to him or he sold it to you. He sold it to me. He sold it to you. Right. Yeah. So Ed was a friend of mine and went over to state drive and so got to know you from afar as you drove that vehicle because I was used to Ed driving the vehicle and if I pointed you to you with the wrong finger I apologize because that adds a good buddy anyway but wait it's been great I know you've served not continuous term but you've served 20 something do we know 40? 40 years total not good one life over 40 So it was, selected 1984. You must have been 12. Yes, thank you, Stephanie. So, and you think about everything that's happened in Belton since then. Pretty much nothing happened in Belton before 1980. Then we founded the state. We ran off the Indians. And then from then on, it's been like, to now now Sam Houston came just before I came before you Pass through so I've probably limited my time to three minutes and the pro-anity to see you so yeah, thank you Right anyone else? All right, there being no others wanting to address the council. We will close I'd like to talk. I was here before he got here and Wayne I go way back We were kin. I'd dox, they told me. Okay. I was here before he got here. And Wayne and I go way back. We were kin folks through family. And Wayne, I guess I'm saying this about more about the whole body, but Wayne, like so many others, when somebody gets on the council, I'll always think, okay, will they be a mayor? What will happen down And he kind of wonder, and Wayne, like every other person before him and after him, was amazing as a mayor. He was a peacemaker. He never let anything get out of hand at any way. And David said it so well, because we person out of me person. And I really hate to see Wayne Carpenter not on the City Council anymore. He has been a blessing for this city and very few people know it. One is involved in the city as we are, but he will be hard to replace because he's got all the qualities that you'd want in a public servant. And that Wayne was going to really miss you. I always kept Wayne was my first cousin. I always said, well we loved Donna, but we liked Wayne a lot more. And that takes never change. And I speak for all my family too, Wayne. We think the world have you. And I hope you have a good time on Tuesday evenings from now on. I appreciate it. And I appreciate your only person around who's been here slightly longer than I have, I think. So, and we've known each other since John was about this tall, which, you know, I was in your wedding. You may not remember, but... The first one. That was a second. Alright. Yeah, I've had more than you, so. We're starting to get into the profanity section of the TMI. I appreciate it. I appreciate your sound advice over the years as well. Great sounding board for the council. I appreciate that. We've had some interesting loss over lots of other strange things over the years that you've had to dig deep, no pun intended, and to find out what we needed to do. And you've always been there when we needed it. So I appreciate you. All right. We'll talk about looking up my senior government teacher from 1984, sitting just down from, has been quite an honor. And it's been an absolute joy to serve with you mayor and from those years and I'm sorry that you got to see my routiness and crazy ways as the youth growing up. Thanks and adults. Just saying. You think he's bad now? I don't really have serious. You've just been an absolute inspiration. It's such a joy to serve with you. And the city of Belgium is truly lucky to have you in your years of service and your years in the school district. You hired Beth when she was pregnant. And Leon Eitz. And we're just in debt to you. I thank the world of you. Thank you so much for being a big part of our life over the years. Thank you John. You're not going to make me cry if we're even going to say anything so. But I appreciate it. It's a blessing to see kids grow up and be successful. successful and John's a perfect example of that. And admittedly, he was probably a better basketball player than he was probably a better basketball player than he was a government student. But he wasn't that bad. He wasn't bad. I was glad to have him. So yes, it's been a great experience for Great experience. Thank you. Yeah, every community has a fabric that makes up the personality and Wayne has been one to help weave that. And it's really amazing to see who we are now, the imprint that he's made on that and will for generations to come. So, all right, we'll get on, we get to do more sappy stuff across the hall in a a little bit. So we'll get on to business. Item three is consider and ordinance on first and final reading authorizing the issue of the Abelton, Texas combination tax and limited revenue certificates of Albin series 2025, levying and ad valorm tax and pledging certain revenues and support of the certificates approving an official statement of paying agent, registrar, agreement, and other related documents awarding the sale of the certificates and authorizing other matters relating to the certificates Mr. Mike. Okay, good afternoon Mayor and Council we're finally here. The bonds that we're going to talk about tonight after delaying a couple of times we're going to pay for some vital utility projects. The fire department will get a ladder truck out of this bond issuance and then we'll get a new public safety center, which is great. So bids were received this morning at 10.30 a.m. Our financial advisor here behind me, Jennifer Ritter, was specialized public finance. We'll like to show you the results of that sale. Yes, you do. Thank you. So I've got a brief presentation here. This is too fancy. All right, so we had to go out and get writing the updated from the pores. No surprise here. They came back. And that one actually is not a part of point, so I think you probably got some more new materials. But they affirm the double A rating, obviously in this market having a strong investment grade credit is crew to be able to receive bids. So they talk a lot about maintaining fund balance, using pay go for prostitutes, financing and everything, a lot of the credit strengths of the community. They talk about potentially upgrading in the next few years if the capital income were to grow something obviously outside of your control. But there are, you know, a little bit of guidelines here for some ways and actually get to the AA plus category in the next few years potentially. So I'll let you look at that. Okay, so we're here tonight as opposed to a couple of weeks ago, is because when we intended to sell this month was right around the implementation of the tariffs. And as you all know, the market didn't react positively to that information. So the day of we saw interest rates, I guess that week, that Tuesday was a little bit uncertain. Interstrates had started to spike up on Monday, continued into Tuesday. That week interest rates put up an entire 100 basis points or 1% edge point during the week of that you would intend to deprise. Some deals did get done, but others got pulled. So you can see here, this is the interest rate scale on tax exam municipal bonds since the beginning of the year. Obviously, we're on the far right hand side that indicates why we asked you to delay. So, you know, given all this environment, the other concern was not simply interest rates and where they may be going, but actually receiving bids with a competitive sale where we go. They've always gone out for a belt because you're strong credit rating and reputation. Investors, investment banks from across the country, BIDEN, whoever has the lowest interest rate wins, well, in a market where they're unstable and uncertain about what's happening, potentially with a recession going. They may not be willing to lend capital, and that was the feedback that we were getting. Is it some may be bidding with potentially a higher interest rate. But others were simply not getting to go ahead or approval from their credit departments to bid on. So that was kind of a discussion that we came to a couple of weeks ago. Sorry, so I'm doing that. OK, so on the grand scheme of things, so this is interest rates in the last 60 years in your market. You can see here, again, on the far right hand side, that we're still lower than some of these other places where we have been. It looks bad when we talk about it in terms of since January, but overall, the average rate in the market currently is about a 5.5%, a little bit under 5.5%, excuse me, 5.5%, a little bit under 5.5%, excuse me 5.24%, but the average has been in the mid-5. So we're so lower than we have been traditionally, but again, you trade better than the average in the market. So as Mike mentioned, we went out at 1030 with a competitive sale, received six bids from firms all across the country. There you can see the winning bidder was Raymond James, which is headquartered on Florida. But you received quite a bit of interest from Texas-based firms, meaning Hilltop, that's the former First Southwest, and Samco out of Dallas, and B.O.K., which is the bank of Oklahoma, but they headquartered out of Dallas. As well as a couple of firms, Milwaukee, and Ohio. So you received six bids. The winning bidder was Raymond James at the 4.27% interest rate. Given all that's happened in the market to be still in the low fours, is obviously a very strong interest rate. It's a credit to you all. I just meant that staff and council have had for the city of Belton and your ability and their belief and your ability to repay these bonds timely. So that's a credit there. As you can see, it was a pretty tight spread. 427, the high bidder there, Kiva Hink was only a 435. So they were all meaning there was a little bit more consensus about where the market was, which is again why we waited. Okay, so what that translates to in terms of the interest rate, here's the debt service schedule. This is for all the purposes. We'll have it separately for the separate purposes. But it's callable beginning in 2033. So should interest rates drop between now and 2333U? Would have the ability to refinance this for savings or pay some of it off? We'll go through the debt service schedules individually. I don't know that we need to talk about that. It's probably more for Mike. But we do have these separate purposes which are here, Sean, the last page, the source of the uses. Funding that wastewater treatment plant, you are using some cash for that as well. The lift station, loop 121 utility, the fire apparatus, which is being put over 10 years right now, a shorter term on that even though it's one CO being sold in the public safety center. to a total there, I'm not as young as I was either. So I have to look here on the far right of the 17.9. We are as you will recall selling 17.290, not the 17.9, that's because again the market likes to price with the premium, they're giving you extra pennies on the dollar to buy your debt. So even though we have a paramount of just under 17.3, we are in the full 17953 for projects as well as cost of issuance out of that. So assuming that council decides to take action tonight and move forward we'd be in a position to close on May 21st which is when the funds would be in your city accounts and we can move forward. Given all that's happening in the market particularly the legislature is obviously looking at ways to limit some tax increases in property tax rates across the state. So we are watching there may be some bills that will restrict your ability to issue COs and any tax supported debt moving forward. Should that happen, we would anticipate quite a bit of activity or volume from other cities trying to sell this summer to get ahead of a September 1 deadline on that. So I think your timing is fortuitous that we're beating some of that perhaps rush to market from other people or trying to do things before they have that ability taken away from them to do so potentially if the legislature moves forward with some of those bills that they've got Fending so happy to answer any questions, but certainly I say We appreciate your flexibility able to delay this twice I think it you know Hopefully worked out well for the city and I think the interest rates and the bids reflect that so happy to answer any questions your bond attorney Richard Donney here from a call of parkerson Horton is here as well and can answer any questions about the bond ordinance. All right, thank you very much. Any comments or questions from council? Just simple math, $12 million that we're borrowing, I get you said it's 17 is the total or so. 17. That's the waste water is 12 so it's 17. 9. Correct. Yeah. So basically 1 percentage difference and so that's 180,000, roughly 180,000 dollars in the first year of savings by postponing this. So again, and then you compile that over or compound that over a couple of years and probably saved one to two million dollars. I don't know if you all would ran the numbers to see what that would be. I don't mean need you to do that. But it looks like we probably saved one to two million dollars in interest payments. So thanks for all doing all. And a big part of that is our fiscal responsibility. Past years and both of them that are something that we like. Yeah, it's really nice to work with a city that knows how to stay within their budget. Love you, thank you. You know, it's something. Anyway. past years and open that up in the middle. Yeah, it's really nice to work with the city that knows how to stay within their budget. Love you, thank you. That's something. Anyway, keep those tax rates low. Who happened to read anything on social media? Yeah, I know we want to wrap this up. So I do have a couple questions. And I have a point to my questions I promise. So if we weren't these bonds what would our options be Mike? Well I don't have this much money in the bank. Right. So how would we get that kind of money? So what you would end up doing one we would have had to have planned for a very long time and and and aside cash for a very long time to do that. Then what that would mean is you're have a higher tax rate potentially than you would otherwise by building up compiling this over many years. So the decision to do this is really in the best interest of our community and our taxpayer. Correct. The best thing, I always say debt, debt's issuing debt, it's kind of more neutral. You've got folks that hate debt, you have folks that love debt. But it's the projects that your financing is the main point of concern. That's the debate. Is it a good project or not? But one of the benefits, if you would, of financing it, is that for the next 30 years, the people that are benefiting from that wastewater treatment plan expansion will be paying for that wastewater treatment plan expansion. If you did it the other way that I was before, where you're setting aside cash as you go, it current today's taxpayers that are paying for that water treatment plan expansion. So there's some equity of ownership, if you will, by financing not only the fact that I don't have them. Well, and then the projects we're funding are critical water sewer public safety. That's correct. And so I ask all of that just because I think I've got a flyer like everybody else in the mail that that that focused on how the Texas legislature is working so hard to slash our property taxes and that local governments are continuing to just eat all that back up with pet projects. And I wanted to really emphasize that these are hardly pet projects. This is a tool for us to be able to use to protect our own community and our taxpayers and do what's best for them in the long run. So to the point that we need to be watching what our legislatures doing and saying, I just commend you all for leading us down this path and guiding us to use a tool that was best in the long run to provide citizens at the best possible break possible. Thanks Stephanie, said it beautiful Mike, we have something to not hear that are not regular some visitors could you just kind of run over briefly what all this is going to pay for. That's great. So I can remember all of this. The wastewater treatment plan expansion, we're 50-50 partners in the Temple Belt and the wastewater treatment plan. We have a 75%, 25% operations type budget there. That project expansion, I want expansion I want to say is 65 million dollar plant expansion and our average that is like 17 million. And so and that project is coming whether we wander down, it's been designed now for half a decade I think it's been's been on some cash. So you say size some cash to the size of cash, then as well. And to follow up with Stephanie said, a lot of what's being done has been mandated by the state of Texas for us to do. That's exactly right. Almost all of it. That lift station project is the lift station that takes wastewater directly into the plant. It's our main force main there. We're loop 121 utility relocations is phase two of loop 121 expansion, which will go south around the expo. That fire apparatus is an aerial apparatus for the fire department. We actually purchased that in January, I believe it was. And then now the bonds will reimburse us for that payment and then we pay for that over time. And then the Public Safety Center is the former Miller Heights Elementary School that we just recently acquired. It's going to be a very nice into the city's facilities. That's an ongoing project that may take some time to develop in full. But we have some plans for that as a public safety facility. And that's a very beneficial to us there. I'm a good buy on that. We 750,000 is what we paid for that. So very good investment there. Anything else? I appreciate you're going over it just for the audience. Also the Miller Hodge project I'm so excited because that sort of neglected area from some people's opinions and I know it's been hard for us to make some headway out there and I think that's going to really improve the overall feel of that part of the community and open it up to future positive growth. So I think it's a great bond issue. All right. Any other comments? All right. Entertain a motion. I'd like to move we proceed with the sale of bonds. Second. We have motion and a second to adopt the ordinance on first and final reading to authorize the issue and some of these bonds comments or questions All right all in favor say aye Those opposed passes six zero and just to let everyone know Councilmember Daniel Booker is not able to be here his father is Has some health concerns and looks like he may not make it. So it's just kind of sad. So pray for Daniel and his family. I think they have like history of like cystic fibrosis or something like that with the lungs. And so he's got, he started to fill up. So anyway, so pray for Daniel, Daniel's father and Daniel. So with that, we are going to stand adjourned, 555.