County approves financing for Marlins stadium - South Florida Business Journal:

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million gap in bond funding for abaseball stadium. The 9-3 vote clears the way for lockinv in the interest rate onthe fixed-rate bonds and construction of the much-debated and long-awaitedf stadium in Miami’s Little Havana. The park is supposed to be finishe dby 2012, with preliminary construction work to begih Wednesday. Commissioners voted after midnight Wednesday to alloew for a higher cap on one of the bondd being sold in order to cover the county’s commitment on the $640 milliohn stadium and infrastructure. The 7.5 percent interest rate cap was changedfto 8.2 percent on the bond tied to conventionh taxes.
The fact that the convention bond will sell at a highet interest rate will result in lowert revenuefor Miami-Dade, County Manager George Burgess explainedr to commissioners. That created the need for more so Florida Marlins President Davis Samson promised to coverthe $6.2 milliojn funding gap. As a result of the the county is on the hookfor $342 millioj in short-term financing, instead of $347 "I feel comfortable with the The Marlins will step up to the plate and pay the additionalo $6 million. At the end of the day, the taxpayers are not goingt to be on the hook for theadditional monies,” Commissioner Bruno Barreiro said aftefr the vote.
Katy Sorenson, Carlosz Gimenez and Sally Heyman were thethree votes. The debate started at 7 but stopped at9 p.m. to allos attorneys to make changes in thefinancinh package. The second chunk of bonds which carry a variabls rate will be priced startingJuly 13, with finapl closing on the county’s portion of the bond financing packages set for no later than July 14. Earlier commissioners approved a change thatraisec ’s status as a creditor in the financing package. which is providing up to a $100 millio n letter of credit, requested that it be paid first fromthe county’ s list of creditors.
The votes on Tuesdau and early Wednesday morning followed two otherbig developments. On June 19, city commissionerzs voted to approve the necessary changesa to the Marlins package to clear the way forthe county’ss changes Tuesday. A circuit court judge also ruled in favoer of the county in one count of a civill lawsuit that could have prevented the county from sellinvg the necessary bonds to buildthe project. That case is on appea l in Miami, as is a lawsuit filed by auto dealerNormamn Braman, who last November lost his legalk bid to declare the stadium’s funding plan unconstitutional. Work on the baseballl stadium site is set tobegin Wednesday.
Crewd will officially break ground onJuly 18. In April, county commissioners approved issuing bonds totaling a maximumof $536 million towarx construction of the $640 37,000-seat ballpark.