By: Diane Benjamin
The Bloomington financial statements have the same debt table as Normal in this story: https://blnnews.com/2019/12/09/more-on-normals-credit-rating-and-debt/
PDF page 91: https://www.cityblm.org/home/showdocument?id=23337
The chart has a typo: the 2035-2029 probably should have been 2025-2029.
$52,090,000 for bond payments and $11,576,172 for interest. The interest adds 22% to the total repayment.
Don’t get too excited because it is lower than Normal:
Long term debt isn’t pretty with pension debt and post employment benefits included:
PDF page 31
For comparison – Normal’s long-term liabilities is below.
PDF page 36 – https://normal.org/DocumentCenter/View/15625/CAFR19-FINAL-DOC
That’s $75,944,329 in pensions and almost another $24 million for benefits.
Instead of a Constitutional Amendment for a “progressive” income tax which will tax you more, the Constitutional Amendment should have been pension reform.
This proves government doesn’t work for the people paying the bills!
YOY increase in pension and OPEB debt in Bloomington is horrifying. Bond debt is slowing dropping while pension-related debt is exploding.
Gosh Diane, I really have to wonder if they’re doing this on purpose. Wild spending. No plan to repay or spend down the debt. And plans to go into even more debt. Are they trying to create a catastrophe? I actually think they are. This is all so breathtakingly irresponsible.