LIBRARY LOUNGE

I prepare these each week for our staff and I thought I would share them here as I miss posting to my Blog but have been too busy!

The Rangeview Library District has a new mission statement and I think is is absolutely perfect!
“We Open Doors for Curious Minds”
It is short and sweet and every employee can easily remember it. It gives us so much to build on. Now down to the hard work of creating our values and goals ;0)
Mindy

After a long year’s work (for me - many years for the Board & others) it is finally finished - now the real work begins as we break ground this Summer!

Rangeview Library District Closes on $43M in Funding for Capital Projects

Adams County, Colorado — The Rangeview Library District successfully completed the sale of $42.9 million of certificates of participation (COPs). The district will use the funds to finance construction of four new branch libraries and the renovation and expansion of three other branches in its system, located in Adams County. Rangeview’s board of trustees authorized the issuance of the certificates in early May. All the certificates sold soon after they were put on the market on June 4 by Stifel Nicolaus, underwriters of the Rangeview Library District’s capital construction project.

Rangeview Library District’s COPs are for a 22-year term with an average interest rate of 4.4 percent. The current low interest rate environment, plus an increase in Rangeview’s bond rating of A1/A+ in January 2008 from Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s Investors Service, allowed the library district to borrow at very favorable terms.

Certificates of participation are lease-purchase funding vehicles where investors purchase a share of the lease revenues of a program rather than the bond being secured by those revenues. COPs have become a popular way, other than traditional bond sales, for municipal authorities to fund capital projects. Built facilities are leased back to the municipality until the lease is paid off.

The library system is funded separately from the county, by an earmarked property mill levy. In 2006, Adams County voters approved a mill levy property tax increase for the projects. The successful passage of the tax increase allowed Rangeview to go forward with its plans to borrow money for construction and expansion project.

The new constructions include a 7,000-square foot branch located in the town Bennett on the eastern plains, a 20,000-square foot downtown branch in the city of Brighton, a 25,000-square foot facility located at 94th Avenue and Huron Street, and a 45,000-square foot library at 120 Avenue between Jasmine and Holly Streets in the City of Thornton, that will also function as the district’s support services hub. The new buildings are slated to open in late 2009.

The district’s Commerce City, Perl Mack and Thornton branches are scheduled to benefit with a program of significant renovations and some space expansions in 2010, also funded through the COP sale.

The Rangeview Library District currently serves 415,000 people in Adams County with six branch libraries and a bookmobile. The county, situated northeast of the City and County of Denver, is the fifth most populous in Colorado. It is predicted to be the fastest-growing Colorado county over the next 20 years. The library district has not had a new library branch since the late 1970s.