Lake Ozark Begins Discussing November Bond Issue

The city board in Lake Ozark is discussing how much money the city should ask the voters to allow them to borrow.

Last night the city had the first reading of the ordinance that would authorize the city to seek $6 million in bonds in the November election. City Administrator Dave Van Dee says the city is making over $3 million in state mandated sewer improvements. The administrator says the city could have more to take care of then just the mandated improvements.

“To cover the $3 million but also, if the opportunity comes along, and say we fall into a situation where three years down the road, four years down the road, we’ve exhausted the $3 million but we also have an opportunity to do an expansion. Allowing for that group capacity is what you’re really doing. It’s setting yourself up so that you have borrowing capacity,” says Van Dee.

Van Dee says the city has exhausted its bonding capacity. The City Administrator says increasing the amount to $6 million does not mean the city will use all of the money, but it will save the city time.

“Here we are, we’re under the consent judgment. We know we’re going to spend the minimum $3 million on that. Let’s assume that we’re in the middle of that and all of a sudden the Horseshoe Ben Parkway or some other development comes along and, but the utility extension, we could have that growth. If you don’t have the capacity, then you have to go to a vote at that time. And at that point the development gets very questionable because most developers don’t want to take that extra time to go to a vote at that point.”

The board plans the second reading of the ordinance at their next meeting.