On March 28, the Woodmen Hills Metropolitan District officially refinanced its 2009 revenue bond and certificate-of-participation agreements into two new agreements at much lower interest rates. The refinance had two parts ñ- a $16.2 million revenue bond agreement at 2.75 percent and a $19,215,000 certificate-of-participation agreement at 2.77 percent, said Lynne Bliss, WHMD board president.The previous interest rate on those service agreements was 8 percent, with interest-only payments, she said.The former bondholders agreed to give the district a $5 million discount on the interest owed to them, and the new 2016 bond is held by Key Government Finance, part of the Key Bank system, Bliss said.Jan Pizzi, WHMD board treasurer, said the new arrangement is better than the previous one because the district is no longer paying only on the interest, which means every payment made is actually reducing the districtís debt.ìOur payments are about the same so we are also able to pay off what we owed and borrow $11 million for a new wastewater treatment plant, while keeping the rates for our customers the same,î Bliss said.Gene Cozzolino, WHMD water/wastewater director, said the new plant will technically be a renovation of the current wastewater treatment plant, but it will use a new type of treatment process. ìWe are going from a lagoon system to a mechanical system,î he said. ìBecause we are just upgrading the current plant and not building a whole new facility, we are able to make this upgrade without special permitting that has to do with the site location.ìWe are not building the new wastewater treatment plant upgrade because Woodmen Hills wants the new plant. We are building it to meet Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment and the (United States) Environmental Protection Agency regulations. We are mandated to do this.îThe current lagoon system is not meeting those regulations, which resulted in a penalty, and the district agreed to pay $170,000, Cozzolino said. The district currently has no ongoing fines, and upgrading the wastewater treatment plant would ideally prevent any future similar penalties, he said.The new mechanical treatment system is also going to reduce or eliminate the odor, which residents have experienced since the treatment plant was built, Bliss said. The new treatment plant is in the design process now and groundbreaking on that facility is planned for October 2017.ìDoing this arrangement also allowed us to free up funds we already had to gradually update the Recreation Center East,î she said. The updates include adding a gymnasium and increasing the size of the locker rooms and lobby area.Pizzi said she has held two roundtable discussions to get input from the community on their preferences for updates. The district wants to spend the money to get the most bang for their buck, she said. The updates are in the early planning stages.ìThis refinancing is something that the board has been working on for eight months and was able to make happen at just the right time to get that very low interest rate,î Cozzolino said.
