UPDATE:
Financial documents obtained by NBC 15 show the water board is in default on the debt service on a $55 million bond with Synovus Bank. The water board did not pay for the months of December of last year or January of this year. John Johnson a Prichard Water Board member is looking for answers.
According to financial documents filed by Synovus Bank, the Prichard Water Board is in default on the debt service of a $55 million bond. The documents show back in December of last year, the Prichard Water Board made a partial payment on November’s bill of more than $140,000, but they were still more than $115,000 short on the scheduled payment. Prichard Water Board member John Johnson said he didn't know about the debt, but he's looking for answers.
"You know what is going on? Where's the money going? Because every time I go there there are customers in line paying their bills, the bills are astronomical. Some customers I get calls all the time with 1,500, 2,000 dollar bills, 3,000 dollar bills and so if they're paying those kinds of bills and being charged that kind of money then Prichard Water has no reason to be going into default," says Johnson.
The data shows no payment was received for December 2022 or January 2023, causing the Prichard Water Board's credit rating by standard and poor's to drop from a "B" to a "CCC," the lowest possible rating an entity can have. The rating was withdrawn due to quote "Lack of timely, reliable, and sufficient information." The waterboard is now currently unrated. I left a message with Jay Ross, the attorney for the Prichard Water Board. He hasn't gotten back to me. Johnson says it's not fair to the customers.
"There's a double standard. Leadership wants whatever is due to them, but then they don't want to provide services to the customers and the residents and it's not fair,” says Johnson. "We have gotten in this situation because of no payment, late payment, and partial payment. It is totally no excuse at all."
ORIGINAL:
According to financial documents filed by Synovus Bank, as the trustee for a $55 million PWB bond issue in 2019, Prichard water is in default on the debt service of the bond.
The documents state that Prichard Water Board made a partial payment $142,991 on December 8, 2022, when the full payment required payment of $258,193 for November.
Subsequent filings note that no payment was received for December 2022 or January 2023.
On December 8, 2022, Standard and Poor’s dropped PWB credit rating from B to CCC, and then withdrew the rating citing “lack of timely, reliable, and sufficient information.”
The CCC rating is the lowest possible rating an entity can receive.
According to other financial filings, Prichard water has operated at a loss the past two years.
The Board reported an Operating Income of -$155,883 in 2020 and -$360,340 in 2021, which has not yet been audited.
The filing reports a gross profit of $7,259,272 with expenses of $7,619,613 in 2021, for a loss of $360,340.
An additional filing noted that the auditor the board was using quit, and the board had yet to find a new auditor and would not meet the required deadline to have their accounts audited.