Public Finance Bond refinancing helps residents of Calabasas

Homeowners who live in The Oaks, a gated community in Calabasas, will pay less on their monthly Mello-Roos, a special tax that finances school, road, library, police and fire protection improvements.

Because it received a higher municipal bond rating last November, the city was able to refinance the 30-year Mello-Roos loan that The Oaks of Calabasas development received about three years ago. Instead of paying a 6.21 percent interest rate on the Mello-Roos, residents will pay a 5.25 percent interest rate, which means an average monthly savings of about $221 per resident-and a lifetime savings of about $5,525-Calabasas City Manager Tony Coroalles said.

"This is the direct result of a more efficiently run city," said Calabasas City Councilmember Barry Groveman. "This is happening because our bond rating went way up . . . We don't have any oil wells here. We're returning money."

The total savings for The Oaks' residents will be about $3 million, city officials said.

The city discovered it could refinance the Mello-Roos by chance, Coroalles said.

"When we were looking to refinance our previous (bonds)-we had one that we were doing for the civic center that we financed recently and saved a lot of money," Coroalles said. "We looked at seeing what else was available that the city had that we could refinance, and then we looked at the MelloRoos for The Oaks, which was about $30 million."

The Oaks community could have kept the same annual payments and cut the payment schedule by two years, but residents opted to cut the amount of their payments.

"This. . .means that there will be more resources to invest within our community and live better," said Calabasas Mayor Dennis Washburn. That's the way it should be, he said.