Even as Election Day stands almost a month away, voters are already heading to the polls. Early voting started Wednesday, Oct 12, and along with casting ballots for president and state and local representatives, Columbusites are voting on various bond issues that will go toward public transit, utilities and schools.
Columbus City Schools
The Columbus City School district is asking for 6.92 mills for deferred maintenance, staffing increases and updated security measures. On the ballot it’ll appear as three separate bonds: .84 mills addresses structural updates (roofing, electrical systems, lighting, etc.); .5 more mills pays for ongoing upkeep; and 5.58 mills adds 325 staff members, including nurses, teachers and social workers, and it would expand existing programs.
Read more here.
COTA
In 2006, voters approved a 10-year, 1/4 percent sales and use tax to expand COTA’s services. On the ballot, voters will decide whether to renew it; it expires March 31, 2017.
“The plan focused on expanding and improving COTA service to meet the needs of a community that had experienced rapid growth,” according to a COTA press release. “Since passage of the levy, COTA has nearly doubled service levels, replaced its aging bus fleet, upgraded its operating facilities, and invested in technologies to improve service reliability.”
Since 2006, ridership levels have soared. There were 19 million passenger trips taken in both 2014 and 2015.
Public services
Funds collected from this bond package on the ballot would pay for infrastructure upkeep, recreation and parks, safety and health and public utilities.
Michael Brown, Columbus resident and Vice President of Strategic Development at Experience Columbus, said the city rarely collects on these bonds and that they’re more like insurance. A supporter of the package, Brown said it’s what gives the city “permission to act,” or permission to go forward on projects.
“Essentially, you know, cities, counties, states and the US government are allowed to sell bonds on the market,” said Brown, who worked for the city under Mayor Michael B. Coleman. “That’s kind of how they take out their mortgages to pay for big projects. In Columbus, the system in place is that the city sells the bonds, and they pay them back over time with the revenue off the income tax.”
Should the voters approve, the city will be able to collect on the bond issues at any time, but Brown said it rarely happens.
“Something like 80 or 100 years — I don’t know; they’ve been selling for a long time,” he said. “And they’ve never used that ability. But it’s us, the voters, saying we trust our city and the direction of our city to pay these debts off over time.”
And if the voters back the bonds at the ballot, the city’s credit goes up, and the interest rate goes down. When the city sells $900 million in bonds, saving even one percent means saving millions of dollars.
For more information on the ballot issues, visit vote.franklincountyohio.gov/election-info/2016.cfm.