CCCOG talks tax, wind farms

The Carbon County Council of Governments (CCCOG) met at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday at the Sinclair Town Hall. The council approved the regular business of minutes from the meeting Jan. 17, the treasurer’s report and the agenda for the meeting to come.

Banner Banter

County Commissioner Sue Jones gave an update on the 2018 Local Option (5th Penny) Tax. She said that the draft of the poster and post cards were being sent to the different municipalities to make sure all the items are correct. She said she was checking with printers for pricing.

“We tweaked the poster making it a little bigger,” Jones said. “We enlarged the font and towns’ names stand out better.”

She said after the changes were made, the posters and cards should be available next month.

Morgan Irene, mayor of Elk Mountain, said his town possessed the banner made from the past campaign. The towns of Elk Mountain, Hanna and Medicine Bow shared it before. Other municipality representatives said they would track down their banners.

TransWest Update

Kara Choquette, TransWest Express LLC Communications Director, gave an update on the TransWest Express Transmission Project that is located south of Sinclair and Rawlins. She said the company was working to acquire the state and county permits along the route that has been mapped out. She said at the end of the year, she was hopeful the Industrial Siting permit from the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality would be attained. Choquette said if all goes well, construction will begin at the end of 2019 or early 2020.

6th Penny

Irene Archibald, the 2009 Specific Purpose Tax Bonds chairperson, said that in 2008 the voters in Carbon County voted for what is referred to as the sixth penny tax. She said eight of the municipalities chose to invest in bonds—meaning a joint powers board was formed with representatives from each entity. Hanna and Dixon did not join the board and Encampment opted out of the bond issue because they got a better rate for a loan with the Wyoming Water Development Commission—but those communities remained on the joint powers board.

There were three series of bonds issued. Series A was issued for the municipality projects in 2009. The Series B bonds were issued by the county in 2010. Series C was a bond used to pay off the hospital.

Payoff, Bond Payoff

Archibald is asking the municipalities to pay off Series A by June 15. She noted on a document presented to the CCCOG council, the interest payment of $193,474.50 is due June 15 and the municipalities will have received a 42 percent interest rebate from the Federal Government Economic Recovery Zone Programs.

The amount of the rebate will not be received until after the June 15 payment is made. It is usually received 30 days after the payment is made. The amount of the rebate on the Series A bond is estimated to be $82,000.

Archibald further noted in her document, the funds to pay off the bonds must be sent to the Bond Trustee, US Bank, by May 30 in order to give the bond trustee time to prepare the electronic transfers to pay off the bond holders by June 15. If the board does not pay off the bonds by June 15, the next date this can be done will be Dec. 15 2018.

“We are at the tail end of paying off these bonds and the interest rate is higher,” Archibald said. “They are carrying a 6.5 percent rate at this point.”

She explained not only are the municipalities paying a higher rate, but the reserve fund they had to set up to get the bonds cannot be touched until December when the bonds are paid off.

Archibald said this is why she is coming to the bonded municipalities to see if they wanted to pay the Series A off before December.

Baggs share is $6,425.64, Elk Mountain $12,851.28, Medicine Bow $4,497.60, Rawlins $29,985.76, Riverside $5,568.49, Saratoga $17,134.48 and Sinclair $8,995.39. This all totals $85,458.73.

Archibald said if this was done, there is an Economic Recovery Zone Programs interest rebate that would pay $82,000 that would be refunded to the municipalities, making the real net amount due, $3,458.73.

Pam Paulson, treasurer from Hanna, said she wasn’t sure of what the town would lose if the bond was paid off earlier since the projected income from the tax would be gone.

Archibald said she wasn’t sure either and Dixon might be in the same situation.

All the municipalities that are bonded must agree to pay early or it won’t happen.

Irene made a motion to take the information given by Archibald to each municipality’s council for paying the bond off early. That motion was approved by the council. It is hoped decisions will be made by the end of April.

TB Flats

Gwynn Bartlett, Carbon County Clerk, gave a summary of TB Flats Energy impact concerns by the municipalities of Elk Mountain, Hanna, Medicine Bow, Rawlins, Riverside, Saratoga, Sinclair and Carbon County. The summary of financial impact by the municipalities and joint powers boards was qualified for Invenergy to study.

Voting Issues

Bartlett went over what was being considered for voting in Wyoming over the next decade. She said that counties in the state are experiencing a lack of election judges and counties are losing polling places. An option is to vote by mail. Voting by mail is allowed in Wyoming in certain circumstances and Wyoming vote by mail has increased by 35 percent since 2012. The legislature would have to pass a law allowing this method. It is available in other states and appeals to young voters.

The next scheduled CCCOG meeting is at 6:30 p.m. on May 16 at either Encampment Town Hall or the Grand Encampment Opera House.