City to save through lower interest on bonds

LACONIA — Taking advantage of record low interest rates, the city is refinancing its debt in a way that will allow it to save about $62,000 in the 2021 fiscal year.

The largest savings will be $29,172 in the fiscal year by refinancing a 2015 bond for work on the fire station, an abandoned dump, the Main Street Bridge and the downtown tax increment financing district. The original debt was $8.1 million.

The current interest rate is 3.25 percent and it is to drop to 2.35 percent by changing the lender from Franklin Savings Bank to Northway Bank.

Other savings come from refinancing a $700,000 bond for a police/fire radio tower, a $2.5 million bond for street, sidewalk and drainage improvements and a $565,000 bond for an Endicott Water Line and Weirs Boardwalk.

Other refinancing is being done on:

— A $1.6 million bond for Endicott Rock, Lakeside Avenue and Messer Street drainage.

— A $1 million bond for the Huot Technical Center.

— A $1.6 million bond for the Weirs tax increment financing district.

— Two $2.5 million bonds for general street, sidewalk and drainage improvements.

-- By Rick Green, Laconia Daily Sun