$10 MILLION IN DEBT WITHOUT YOUR VOTE?

This post is a bit long, but if you care about having to repay a $8,400,000 debt (over $10,000,000 with interest) that you had no vote in, please continue reading.

I believe a government should be open with its citizens. Some call it "transparency".

This is especially true for the City of Nederland and all other local governments. National defense and national security are not handled at this level. Other than personnel records or ongoing law enforcement cases (and maybe a couple of other very specific reasons that don't come to mind right now), everything else should be open for the citizens to read and then make an intelligent choice.

If you've ever seen City Council agendas, they are usually very short (a couple of pages). They sometimes have wording like this from the October 28, 2024, Agenda:

"Item 4m. Consider action approving Ordinance No. 2024-27, authorizing the issuance of City of Nederland, Texas, Combination Tax and Revenue Certificates of Obligation, Series 2024; and levying ad valorem tax; pledging certain net revenues; authorizing the executive of a transfer and paying agency agreement and other matters in connection therewith."

Nowhere in the three-page agenda given to the public that day was a copy of Ordinance No. 2024-27.

The item passed 4-0 (Councilman Guillot was absent). See the minutes for this meeting at http://nederlandtx.us/NederlandPublic/DocView.aspx...

Sounds innocent enough, right?

This action will wind up costing the taxpayers of Nederland over $10,000,000 in principal and interest payments for the next 20 years before all is said and done.

The City Manager proposed (and Council approved) issuing Certificates of Obligation (COs) in the amount of just over $8,400,000 for the water system.

The City of Nederland has over $18,000,000 in the bank. I don't know why they didn't want to use the money we already have to make these repairs. I also don't know why they didn't want to allow the voters to vote on this item. A main difference between COs and Bonds is that bonds require a vote of the people whereas COs can be issued by a vote of only five people (the City Council). A disadvantage to COs is that they usually have higher interest rates than voter-approved bonds.

Remember Ford Park? Jefferson County Commissioners Court issued COs over 20 years ago instead of asking for voter approval, and this cost the then-county judge his seat at the next election.

The ordinance did not say how much interest we, the taxpayers, will have to pay for these COs over the next 20 years. Last night, I asked who bought these COs, but no one on City Council nor the City Manager nor the City Finance Officer could answer the question.

Team DOJ (Jeff Darby for Nederland Mayor, Jeff Ortiz for Nederland, and Britton Jones for Nederland City Council) believe in being open with our fellow taxpayers. We will trust the citizens to decide whether or not we can borrow money by calling a bond election if needed. We will NOT put our city in debt by a choice of 5 people.

I will look over the last few years and see how many other COs were issued by the City Council that we didn't know about, and report back to you.

Jeff Darby

Candidate for Nederland Mayor