Brown Deer schools get $2.4 million additional bonds for campus remodel

The Brown Deer School District will have an additional $2.4 million in Qualified Zone Academy Bonds, QZAB, that will be used toward the remodeling of the middle school and the portion of the high school that will be used by the seventh and eighth grades once the move to a two-school campus is accomplished in 2013.

Director of Finance Emily Koczela said the authorization for additional bonds means taxpayers will save the interest on $2.4 million over the next 10 years.

Under the QZAB program, bondholders get federal tax credits instead of cash interest payments.

In June 2011, the district learned it got authority for $5 million under the program. The program requires a 10 percent match from the community.

Koczela said plans are under way for the match for the initial $5 million. Four projects, including the campus clean up, garden, plantings, creek clean up, the website, and the annual maintenance corps of volunteers, a Middle School PTO sponsored Science is Fun Fair and 20 internships per year for the next five years, and an educational concert or performance, are either under way or in the planning stage. Koczela estimates the value of the projects will be more than $500,000, or 10 percent, provided they all come to fruition.

Voters approved spending of $22 million in a referendum in November. The QZAB money will be $7.4 million of that $22 million.