RGS employees Charlie Francis and Brian Moura were instrumental in assisting the City of Sausalito with a Certificates of Participation (COPs) program. The full text of the story below appeared in the “2015 Year in Review” edition of Sausalito Currents.

MLK Certificates of Participation Issued. In November, Sausalito voters passed Measure F, an advisory measure that directed the City Council to move forward with Certificates of Participation (COPs) that will raise a total of $7.4 million ($7.2 million in project funds and $0.2 million to cover the cost of issuance).

The City Council reauthorized the issuance of the COPs on December 1 and City Staff moved quickly to bring the COPs to market and price the issue on December 10. The City’s “AA” rating generated a lot of investor interest when the COPs were brought to market. The COPs were sold with a premium of more than $430,000 by the banks and investors that purchased them through the underwriting firm handling the sale. This premium reduced the amount of debt required to be issued by the City from $7.4 million (projected) to $6.94 million (actual). The $6.94 million is the “par value” (face value) of the COPs, i.e. the amount of the debt that the City issued to receive $7.4 million in proceeds. Annual debt payments over the fourteen year life of the COPs will now be $619,000 per year compared to the $630,000 per year that was originally projected. This speaks not only to the attractiveness of the issue but also the strong credit worthiness and financial position of the City.

Funds from the COPs will enable the City to do much-needed work at the MLK site and Robin Sweeny Park, Southview Park and Dunphy Park. The next step in the process will be to move forward with the improvements at Robin Sweeny Park. The Parks and Recreation Department and the Public Works Department are already working on this phase of the capital improvements. The plan is to bring the project to the City Council at the first Council meeting of 2016, on January 12. Work on the three additional sites (MLK, Southview and Dunphy) will be under development soon.