By MATT PIKE
St. Joseph Post
The Buchanan County R-IV School District must rerun a bond issue that passed in April. after an error by the Buchanan County Clerk’s office.
Superintendent Travis Dittemore says the bond for the sale of $2 million in bonds for renovations at the high school in Dekalb and elementary school in Rushville passed during the April election, however
“When our bonding agent, which is L.J Hart, when they started the process of actually selling our bonds so we could start to collect the funds, they could not find where the ads had been properly run in area publications by the County Clerk,” Dittemore tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post. “And that’s part of the election process; that’s part of what you pay for when you pay the clerk for an election.”
Dittemore emphasizes due to that error, the $2 million approved in April was not allowed to stand,
“This $2 million we’re asking them to raise, and I would mention this is a no tax increase, we’re not raising taxes. This is perfectly doable by the district without touching any of our operating or debt service money,” Dittemore explains. “We’re just asking people to understand that we don’t need an additional $2 million, this is the original $2 million, we’ve just got to take another run at it.”
Dittemore says while the district waits to see if the issue passes, the district can continue to talk with potential contractors and get proposals and estimates
“We just can’t enter into any agreements without the district funds, because until the election passes officially and is approved by the state auditor and L.J Hart can sell the bonds, there’s no funds to be had,” Dittemore says. “So basically, right now, anything that was already in place has been put on hold, we can continue to plan and organize.”
With the bond issue returning to the ballots in August, it will require 2/3 votes to pass. Dittemore says during the April election, the bond passed easily above the 4/5 majority needed to pass.
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