The Metro Council has received Mayor Kip Holden’s bond proposal, a $748 million package split into three separate components representing public safety, infrastructure and economic development/recreation projects. The council, which is on summer break and is not scheduled to meet again until July 27, now has less than one month to decide whether to place the proposal on the Nov. 19 ballot. The deadline is Aug. 10. The breakdown of the bond proposal is as follows:
—Public safety: $350 million for a parish prison ($151 million), juvenile detention center ($44 million), public safety complex ($102 million) and city hall consolidation ($52 million); calls for a 0.25% sales tax and 2.15 mills in property tax for 20 years.
—Infrastructure: $366 million for drainage improvements ($194 million), traffic signal replacement and synchronization ($53 million), bridge replacement/repairs ($79 million) and a 1,300-space parking garage for River Center/downtown ($37 million); calls for a 0.25% sales tax and 0.75 mills in property tax for 20 years.
—Economic development/recreation: $32 million for completion of River Center phase II renovations; calls for 0.25% sales tax and 0.25 mills in property tax for five years (no bond would be issued for this component).
“Nothing in the proposal should be new to you, with the exception of the inclusion of the ‘bridge replacement/repairs’ that you were fully briefed on a few months back,” says John Carpenter, chief administrative officer, in the bond proposal cover letter to Metro Council members dated July 7. At least one council member expressed a favorable reaction. “We’re long overdue for a bond issue in this community, and I think we need to move this plan forward,” says Councilwoman Tara Wicker. “I’m going to support it.”
A number of other council members, however, have said for more than a month that the mayor has waited too long to reveal the bond proposal details. Mayor Pro Tem Mike Walker doesn’t believe a majority of the council will support sending it to voters. “I don’t have a sense that the council is supportive of it at all,” Walker says. “Tara (Wicker) is the only one that I know of who has said with any certainty that they’ll support it. I just think the timing is bad. People are still having a hard time putting gas in their cars and paying their bills.” Read a recent Business Report story on the chances of a bond issue passing this year here.
