With $230,000 in grant money from the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board (IRRRB) in hand, the Tofte town board decided it could soon seek construction bids to begin ground work this fall on a planned 12-unit senior housing development in Tofte on land located just behind the Birch Grove Community Center.
A second grant in the amount of $245,000 will be sought from the IRRRB in the fall, said Dick Grabko of Community Resource Development (CRD), who appeared before the board at its July 10, 2014 meeting.
Grabko’s organization has been working with the township on all aspects of planning for senior housing.
Nick Anhut, of Ehlers & Associates, is working with the township to secure and issue tax-exempt General Obligation (G.O.) bonds. “A G.O. is a pledge of the full faith credit of the town in the event that housing revenues do not meet expectations,” Anhut wrote in a memo to the board.
Grabko said a public hearing could be called and held as early as July 24 to talk about the bonds. If the public agreed the bonds were a good idea the board could then adopt an abatement resolution authorizing sale of the bonds at that time and the bonds could be sold by September 15.
“You would have $1,500,000 to work with,” said Grabko.
But township attorney Chris Hood, who was in attendance, said, “If you don’t need that money right away, you don’t want to issue the bonds because you will be paying a lot of interest.
“I would recommend that you hold off on the issuance of bonds and spend the first $230,000 before asking the IRRRB for the other $245,000,” Hood said, telling the board that it would take a relatively short time to sell the bonds when the need arose.
He also said that a local bank could most likely provide the township with a short-term loan if they needed more money than they had on hand for the work that will be done this fall.
Hood also advised the board to ask the county or school district to give its blessing to the town for the issuance of the G.O. bonds. That blessing from another taxing district, said Hood, would allow the township to go from 15- to a 20-year period to pay back the bonds. West End Cook County Commissioner Bruce Martinson said he would ask the county to do this on behalf of the township.
While some infrastructure work can be done this fall, the majority of construction will take place in 2015 and the first units (hopefully) will be done by July, said Grabko. Design Homes has been contracted to design and build the two-bedroom units. To keep rental costs down garages won’t be built in the beginning, but may be added later, or a community garage may be built, said James.
Rents are expected to run from $950 to $1,050 per month. Tofte Supervisor Paul James said he has been hearing that some out-of-town people are already interested in renting when the units are finished.
“That’s great, but the intent is to take care of our local people first,” said James.
After some discussion between Supervisors James, Jim King and Jeanne Larson, it was agreed upon to form a committee and figure out a rating system that would give locals a preference in renting the units.
“Hopefully some of these homes now owned by seniors can be sold to younger people needing housing,” said Larson, adding that, “We need to get creative here to see if there is a way for that to happen.”
In other business:
. Supervisor Larson talked about wanting to start a Facebook page for Tofte but James cautioned, “We need to be really careful about what we put on social media. We can create some very interesting situations with our postings and responses to those postings. We can’t have free-flowing information without approval of the township. I’ve seen problems with that,” he said.
Larson said she envisioned the town’s Facebook page to be used only to announce events and notifications about meetings, times, and places. Hood said comments could be filtered so they couldn’t be added to the page, and he thought Larson’s idea was a good one.
Larson said she had an article showing how a board could use Facebook. She agreed to forward that article to Hood and he agreed to get back to the board with a formal legal opinion about the township’s liability in having its own Facebook page.
. Tofte town clerk Barb Gervais said there has been no update from Verizon about the planned cell phone tower in Tofte. Verizon is currently paying the township a lease fee for the land the tower will sit on, but just when the tower will go up and put into operation isn’t yet known, and people are getting antsy about getting better cell phone service, she said.
. The board unanimously passed a motion to accept a facility operation guideline for the building and grounds of the Birch Grove Community Center grounds. New Birch Grove Foundation director Caroline Wood compiled the document.
“This is a very carefully worded document with a good deal of common sense thrown in there,” said King.
The board will review the document annually to see if any changes or updates need to be added.
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