The five-year ceiling on borrowing backed by the general fund means few large projects can be done at once without hitting Greenwich’s $210 million debt limit, according to Democrats who support overturning the curb.
They point to aging structures like the Eastern Greenwich Civic Center, which the town acquired in 1966, and which has cracks in its facade and chunks of concrete missing from exterior walls. They also note the seaside Byram Shore Park, where town documents say the pool has a “continuous leak.”
“There’s an opportunity for improvement here in terms of addressing our older buildings a little earlier than before the end of their useful lives,” Mary Lee Kiernan, a Democratic member of the Board of Estimate and Taxation, told about 50 residents in a standing-room-only meeting at Town Hall on Jan. 15.
“If we delay beyond the useful life, it’s going to cost taxpayers more to replace these buildings, and it can impact town services,” she said.
Debt Stretch
Stretching debt payments over 10 or 20 years spreads out the cost of projects, matches an asset’s debt with its lifespan and enables the town to lock in low interest rates, she said.
Twenty-year general obligations yielded 4.55 percent on Jan. 16, below a 40-year average of 6.3 percent, according to Bond Buyer data.
Kiernan, along with five other Democrats on the taxation board, have failed to make the case within local government. On Sept. 24, they couldn’t secure the seven votes needed to overturn the current borrowing policy, though they continue to push their views in public forums.
Joseph Pellegrino, a Republican member of the 12-member tax board, defended the current borrowing practice at the Town Hall meeting.
“If you could finance everything with cash, you would,” he said. “Then you wouldn’t have any expense going to a third party.”