ARE RIVER CAMPUS PLANS STILL AFLOAT?

A proposed bond issue to help develop the River Campus could be back on the ballot in April.

That's one option being considered by Southeast Missouri State University officials and civic leaders in the wake of Tuesday's election. Cape Girardeau voters on Election Day approved a tax measure to help fund the project but failed to give a bond issue the super majority needed for passage.

Project supporters may look at the possibility of the university issuing bonds and using revenue from the city tax measure to retire them. That scenario would eliminate the need for another election.

"Maybe we could reasonably proceed without the city having to issue general obligation bonds," said Don Dickerson, president of the university's Board of Regents.

But Dickerson, a Cape Girardeau lawyer, said he doesn't know about the legality of such a move.

Mayor Al Spradling III said putting the bond issue back on the ballot may be the best solution because "it would be straight forward."

The city also could secure a better interest rate with such a bond issue, Spradling said.

University President Dr. Dale Nitzschke said all options will be examined in an effort to keep the project afloat.

Dickerson said he hopes project supporters will decide how to proceed by the end of the month.

The deadline for getting a tax measure on the April ballot is Jan. 26.

Southeast wants to spend $35.6 million to develop old St. Vincent's Seminary into a visual and performing arts school.

The university wants the state to pay half of the cost. It had proposed that the other $17.8 million would have been raised from private donations and a city bond issue and tax measure.

Voters on Tuesday approved a measure that increases the city's motel-hotel tax and extends the restaurant and motel-hotel taxes to the year 2030. The measure garnered 53 percent approval.

But an accompanying measure that would have permitted the city to issue $8.9 million in bonds failed to garner the 57.2 percent needed for passage. It received 53 percent approval from voters.

Despite the failure of the bond issue, the motel-hotel tax will increase from 3 percent to 4 percent on Jan. 1.

If the state and university haven't committed funds to the project by Dec. 31, 2001, the tax increase and extension will expire, City Manager Michael Miller said.

The revenue collected from the tax increase would be put toward retirement of the bonds that financed construction of the Show Me Center.

The hotel-motel tax would return to its 3 percent level. That tax and the 1 percent restaurant tax would remain in effect to 2004, the original termination date for the taxes.

Miller said all the provisions were spelled out in an ordinance approved by the City Council when it placed the tax issue on the November ballot.

Officials with the city, university and the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce said Tuesday's vote wasn't all doom and gloom.

Both the bond issue and the tax measure received support from the majority of those voters who went to the polls.

"The majority of the people want this to happen," said Nitzschke. "That is very clear and that is very positive."

John Mehner, chamber president, said the bottom line is that voters approved the funding mechanism to retire bonds, but no bonds can be issued.

"Isn't it amazing," said Mehner, "that we can elect a president at 47 percent, but we can't issue bonds at less than 57 percent?"

Spradling said the bond issue could fare better in the municipal election in April when there would be fewer items on the ballot.

Spradling said the two River Campus measures may have been lost in the shuffle with the many political offices and state constitutional issues on Tuesday's ballot.

Of the 10,000 city voters who went to the polls Tuesday, 847 didn't vote on the River Campus tax measure and/or bond issue.

The two River Campus issues were at the end of the punch-card ballot. "I don't know whether people got bored or they lost interest," said Spradling.

Voters rejected both River Campus measures in six of the 16 precincts, mostly in the southern part of the city. Those six included the precinct that is home to the seminary site.

Voters in a 7th precinct approved the bond issue but rejected the tax measure.

Following the election, the Southeast Missourian polled 596 residents in the precincts that turned down the River Campus measures.

Thirty-eight percent said they didn't support the River Campus plan. They offered various reasons ranging from their uncertainty about the project to opposition to a tax increase and a belief that the university should pay for the project.

The bond issue would need a four-sevenths majority for passage in April, the same as was needed in the recent November election.

But if the bond issue were placed on the August or November ballot next year, it would take a two-thirds majority for passage, election officials said.

Missouri election laws require the larger majority for passage of bond issues at elections other than the municipal election, the primary and the general election.

Because no primary or general election is scheduled next year in Missouri, an August or November election date would require a two-thirds majority.

Southeast bought the former Catholic seminary earlier this year. The purchase was funded with an $800,000 financial gift from Cape Girardeau resident B.W. Harrison.

Dickerson said the gift was conditioned upon the university buying the downtown property and using it for educational purposes.

Dickerson said the university has the right to sell the property but would prefer to develop the 16-acre site as its River Campus.

"If we can't use it for some great purpose, then the property, of course, would have to be sold," said Dickerson. "That is the last thing in the world that we would want to do."