Guam – Speaker and Education Committee Chair Senator Judi Won Pat issued the following release in reaction to the Governor’s decision directing GEADA to move forward on plans to expand Okkodo High School.
READ Speaker Won Pat’s release in FULL below:
PL 30-182 authored by Speaker Judith T. Won Pat allowed for the expansion of Okkodo High School to address overcrowding in the northern schools. The public law authorized the government of Guam to issue a total of Twenty-One Million Eight Hundred Eighteen Thousand Dollars ($21,818,000) in Qualified School Construction Bonds (QSCBs) to finance the construction, rehabilitation, or repair of public school facilities.
“I thank Governor Calvo for moving on this since passage of the law. The expansion will alleviate overcrowding in the northern schools which has always been a concern of mine. With other issues facing our public school system, there is always a ray of hope that shines through and this is one of them. Progress on this project should begin soon and with Mr. Jon Fernandez on board and the Guam Education Board’s cooperation, once again, our public school system can pride itself, even when facing seemingly insurmountable challenges, on making the most with what it has to work with.”
QSCBs are a new form of bonds authorized under § 54F(d) of the Internal Revenue Code. Issuers of QSCBs are eligible to receive direct payments from the federal government, which offset a portion of the bond interest payments. Under current market conditions, the government of Guam can realize substantial net interest costs savings by issuing QSCBs over traditional tax exempt bonds.
QSCBs were authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA).
