I know that I said I would not have sour grapes over the new Events Center, and I don’t, but I will continue to point out the inequities in what we were told and what will really happen.
If you watch today’s informational meeting, they are talking about the bond sale and repayment for the Events Center (FF: 19:00) Doug Hajek says this;
“There is a reference to the dollar amount, the final maturity date on these bonds would be potentially as late as 2037 . . .”
The Mayor and his team sold the public on a 22 year repayment period with an end date of 2033. This is the information that they were ALL giving to the public BEFORE the vote. If you go to page 30 of this presentation you will see the 22 year repayment schedule. You will also see that they were promising under a 4% interest rate (Doug Hajek brought up in the presentation tonight it could cost as high as 4.75%)
There was also some interesting testimony during the public input of the City Council meeting (FF: 6:00) Ray Woody Woodsend spoke, I did not understand all that he was saying BUT HE IS OBJECTING TO THE WAY THAT THEY ARE STRUCTURING THE BOND SALE AND SAYS THAT IT WILL UTIMATELY END UP COSTING SF TAXPAYERS MORE THAN IT SHOULD AND WILL ALSO EXPOSE US TO MORE RISK THAN IS NECESSARY!
None of this surprises me from a mayor who was a former marketing manager of a subprime credit card company.
Bullocks! Bullocks! Carry on!