Syracuse City Council Meeting - August 12, 2026
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Syracuse City Council Meeting - August 12, 2026
The Syracuse City Council met on August 12, 2026, to discuss a bond refinancing, a pre-application consultation for a mixed-use development at 3300 South and 2000 West, a zone change request to allow pygmy goats, and a zone change for a surplus UDOT property. The council authorized the bond refinancing process, expressed opposition to the proposed mixed-use development, reached majority support for the goat rezone, and deferred a commercial rezone pending the planning commission's recommendation.
Public Comments & Testimony
- During the discussion of the zone change from R2 to A1 for the property at 2961 South 1550 West, multiple neighbors attended a public hearing and expressed support for the rezone to allow the property owner to keep pygmy goats. The owner stated the goats help keep a detention basin clean. Council member noted the rezone was initiated after a complaint led to a code violation.
Discussion Items
- Bond Refinancing: Council discussed refinancing a 17-year bond on the city building. Current rate is 4.95%; potential savings estimated at $50,000–$75,000 per year if rates drop to the high 3% range. Closing costs estimated at $60,000–$80,000. Some members expressed concern about missing deeper savings later, but a majority agreed to proceed. The council authorized the process and will consider a parameters resolution on September 8th.
- Pre-Application Consultation for 3300 S and 2000 W: Chase Andreasy of DAI and Candlelight Homes presented a proposal for a mixed-use development including townhomes, storage, and light commercial. Council members expressed strong opposition, stating citizens have low appetite for more townhomes and storage, and that the property is commercially viable. They recommended full commercial use without residential. No formal action was taken; council advised mixed-use is not a fit for the city at this time.
- Zone Change from R2 to A1 for Pygmy Goats: The planning commission forwarded a recommendation for approval. Council discussed concerns about the rezone applying in perpetuity, but noted the property is adjacent to other A1 land and neighbors are supportive. A majority supported the rezone. The council decided to place it on the consent agenda for the September meeting.
- Zone Change from A1 to Light Commercial for 2207 South 1700 West: The planning commission had not yet considered this item due to the cancellation of the August meeting. A public hearing is scheduled for next Tuesday. The council will wait for the planning commission's recommendation and forward the item to the September 8th meeting.
Key Outcomes
- Authorized the process to refinance the bond; a parameters resolution will be presented on September 8th.
- Provided feedback to the developer that mixed-use is not desired; no further meetings of this type will be held.
- Reached majority support to rezone 2961 South 1550 West from R2 to A1; the item will be placed on the consent agenda for the September meeting.
- Deferred the zone change for 2207 South 1700 West to September 8th, pending the planning commission's recommendation.
Meeting Transcript
Um that will help our our financial situation. This is just another mechanism we can try and save some money. So if we uh Steve, if we have value or if we did the work um to be prepared to go to market, um, and we don't find terms that are acceptable that we have out of pocket expenses. Yes, and do you know about what those are? So on our last refinance we did, it's typically probably around 50 to 70,000. It's not it's not a cheap bill to get a rating. I would say it's between 30 and 40,000. I could be way off, not way off, but it's it's in that range. Okay. Our financial advisor closing is also somewhere in that range as well. So the combined closing costs are on 60 to 7. No, you said it what's our current rate? 4.95%. So we're looking so you ran these numbers at 3.95 or something. Um when we ran it, the 75 was about a month ago in 75,000 savings per year. We've seen the rates creep up. I think they'd still be in the high three percent range. We don't know until we go to market. Um, when we went with this bond on this building, we were expecting one and a half percent. We got 0.61, which was out of this world awesome. I don't anticipate getting anything lower than uh maybe a 3.75. I we don't know. It's the market changes daily. So basically the objective is trying to save one or one percent. Yeah, that's 50 to 75 to save one percent. But what if what if those are all the fees and all the fees? The fees are built into that savings. So um typically on a refinance, if it's above a three percent savings, it's recommended to do so. One when you fall on that but less than three percent savings, it's just not enough to to justify um moving forward. Well, we're seeing you know, eight to ten percent. That's that's a really good um savings on the bond. Again, I don't know where rates are gonna go uh in the next 10 years. Are they gonna go lower than than a 3.8 or 3.9 percent? I don't know. Um, what I do know is it's better than a 4.95. That's the same. That's the thing when you're trying to guess in a term what the market's gonna do. Nobody can do that, and so in my opinion, we have to evaluate whether or not the potential savings is worth it to do it in today, right? Um, because none of us know what's going to happen in the next 10 years. We we could we could see nothing. We can see a world would come any more close to 3.75, which I probably lean towards trying to do it for the cost savings that we know that we do though. What do we know? What they provided in the packet. I know, but that that's not what we really know. It's what we are speculative, it's speculation at this point. Yeah, it's we're risking basically the savings of one year in anticipating that we'll get nine more years of savings out of it. It's a reasonably good chance we will. The only real question is would we get even more? Who knows? We would have one more bite of the apple in 10 years.
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