CUMBERLAND — The city’s bond rating recently increased from “A” to “A+,” Ken Tressler said.
Tressler, the city’s director of administrative service, provided an overview of a debt ordinance and the city’s bond rating to the mayor and City Council at a work session Tuesday.
“It’s never been that high,” he said of Cumberland’s bond rating since it started to be documented in 2008.
A higher bond rating means the city can get lower interest rates on new loans.
“We’re managing our spending … we’re managing our debt,” Tressler said.
“Overall, I think we’ve done a good job of managing things we have control over,” he said and added issues such as the city’s declining population, educational level and economy aren’t as easy to handle.
The council at a subsequent public meeting heard a first reading of an ordinance that would provide for issuance and sale of $5.2 million of general obligation bonds.
“We’ve already spent some of the bond proceeds,” Tressler said of using funds for items including purchase of a road paving machine.
In other business:
• The council met privately Tuesday to receive legal advice regarding entry into a new tolling agreement with CSX and to discuss “threatened litigation pertaining to CSX” with staff, according to an agenda for the closed session.
• Three people at Tuesday’s meeting asked the council to remove fluoride from city water.