Travis County Commissioners Court
Tuesday, November 22, 2011 (Agenda)
Item 4
Number 4.
4.
approve reimbursement resolution for purchase of land, vehicles, equipment, building renovations, construction of public works and other authorized purposes.
>> hi, you had a resolution that was prepared by the attorney and approved by bond council as we agreed to last week, there are a number of projects that we are wanting to get started on.
some of them, all of them for good reasons but some of them were contractual reasons as well, that, for example, purchase of property that needs to happen before the end of the year, some other projects that have very strict time lines and speaking with our financial advisor, lad patillo and prior conversations with the county auditor, I believe our bond situation the will be similar to previous years or at least this last year with proceeds to arrive approximately in early June and, therefore, these -- this reimbursement resolution will allow for the budget adjustments posted also to allow departments to begin these projects and then properly reimburse with bond proceeds and co proceeds once those arrive.
I am happy to answer any questions.
>> judge, the items listed under number 3, are those things we are considering as part of that resolution?
>> yes, ma'am.
all of the budget adjustments that are listed under number 3 are related -- not all of them, but the ones that are coming from the unallocated reserves specifically and then some from the allocated reserve as well, given the discussions last week, I should mention that I went back and reviewed with departments to make sure that, first of all, these reimbursements resolutions were needed and the budget adjustments were needed and a few of them were modified a little bit and also, any projects that were under a million dollars, we tried to go ahead and gear those towards the allocated reserve instead of unallocated reserve.
I did have discussions with lad patillo about using unallocated reserve and informed him what we planned on doing and how the rating agencies would react.
we don't have any requirement to notify the rating a agencies we will be doing these reimbursement resolutions but during the management highlights next year, it is always good to keep them informed.
of course that will be directly prior to when we get the proceeds back and are able to reimburse ourselves.
this is a process that we have utilized in the past.
I wouldn't say on annual basis but a pretty regular basis over the last ten years and we always issued and we always have been able to reimburse ourselves.
>> haven't we brought up this before, when we had the meetings with the bond agencies?
because the it is nothing new -- it is not new to us?
>> no, it isn't.
one of the things -- in a way, it is a timing issue.
and, you know, we used to go to the bond rating agencies in December -- late December and then we would issue early in the next calendar year, but with the financial -- one of the financial markets started turning up on their heads, we were going out audited statements and so really with the financial markets the way they are and the new requirements and everything, we really need to go with audited statements rather than unaudited statements, and the audited ones are more than a year old and that's why the schedule has been turned back and what the law does is allow you to, in essence, borrow from the general fund, if you know you are going to issue.
the risk, which is probably a small risk, is if, in fact, you could not issue, I would hit an expense on unallocated reserve and if it's 20 million or whatever it is, then that drops your reserves by that amount of money.
we have done it before.
it is nothing unusual.
it is consistent with the law.
we are not -- one of the things we have to disclose is if we go into that urn allocated reserve because we are in financial trouble, that is certainly not this.
so it is not as though we have a financial issue.
>> right.
>> the only thing you can do in future years, if you were uncomfortable with this, is kind of plan ahead and issue a year ahead of time.
like, for instance, you could, right now, it is kind of too late this year, but you could be analyze what you need for the fiscal year after that so that you don't need a reimbursement resolution, but then you would be borrowing a little earlier than you needed.
but, yeah, there is nothing -- and now, pbo has contacted our staff and we will be borrowing from ourselves.
>> yes.
>> and then we repay it.
>> repay it.
>> that's exactly right.
>> well, number 3, I guess is an item -- but I am just -- what I am really excited about in looking at this is several projects that we have within that, but this particular vehicle that we are using here now, the reimbursement resolution itself just allows to advance and I think we need to understand that, just advance the money up front and a lot of this is a timing issue.
as you know, when you came to the court last -- last week on this particular item, we looked at the doppler ranch conservation easement agreement, the 244-acres that were listed in that particular action that we take on last week to allow this to happen today, as far as the funding mechanism being in place.
however, also, the vehicle to actually do the funding, but, of course, reimburse that particular funding source under this reimbursement resolution, so it is just a continuum of what we did last week, but there are other things other than the conservation easement of the creek doppler ranch 244 project which we actually got involved in and that was basically under a timing because you did mention timing.
of course, that is under a timing issue, and it still is, so this here would allow this under the time under the requirement that this is -- that is before us now.
I will pull item number 4 -- I will move approval on it if we make a notion of it.
>> second.
>> and we need to move forward with it.
>> we won't do it at all, especially under the untouchable reserve, unallocated reserve and today we have 8 projects.
some of these clearly were unforeseeable.
others were, and really three or four of them are pretty routine, so I just think -- and we ought to plan to plan in such a way that we don't have to do a reimbursement resolution.
>> you can do that, judge.
>> yeah.
>> you can do that.
>> not on all of these but some of them.
on one, we had no choice but to cut the unallocated reserve at least on timing of decision.
>> makes sense.
>> cars, computers, buy those every year.
>> yes, we that up a year.
we could.
>> any more discussion on a motion?
all those in favor?
this passes by unanimous vote.
>> thank you.
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