The following examples illustrate the application of this section:
Example 1. Aggregation of payments.
State B issues bonds with proceeds of $10 million. B uses $9.7 million of the proceeds to construct a 10-story office building. B uses the remaining $300,000 of proceeds to make a loan to Corporation Y. In addition, Corporation X leases 1 floor of the building for the term of the bonds. Under all of the facts and circumstances, it is reasonable to allocate 10 percent of the proceeds to that 1 floor. As a percentage of the present value of the debt service on the bonds, the present value of Y’s loan repayments is 3 percent and the present value of X‘s lease payments is 8 percent. The bonds meet the private security or payment test because the private payments taken into account are more than 10 percent of the present value of the debt service on the bonds.
Example 2. Indirect private payments.
J, a political subdivision of a state, will issue several series of bonds from time to time and will use the proceeds to rehabilitate urban areas. Under all of the facts and circumstances, the private business use test will be met with respect to each issue that will be used for the rehabilitation and construction of buildings that will be leased or sold to nongovernmental persons for use in their trades or businesses. Nongovernmental persons will make payments for these sales and leases. There is no limitation either on the number of issues or the aggregate amount of bonds that may be outstanding. No group of bondholders has any legal claim prior to any other bondholders or creditors with respect to specific revenues of J, and there is no arrangement whereby revenues from a particular project are paid into a trust or constructive trust, or sinking fund, or are otherwise segregated or restricted for the benefit of any group of bondholders. There is, however, an unconditional obligation by J to pay the principal of, and the interest on, each issue. Although not directly pledged under the terms of the bond documents, the leases and sales are underlying arrangements. The payments relating to these leases and sales are taken into account as private payments to determine whether each issue of bonds meets the private security or payment test.
Example 3. Computation of payment in variable yield issues.
(i) City M issues general obligation bonds with proceeds of $10 million to finance a 5-story office building. The bonds bear interest at a variable rate that is recomputed monthly according to an index that reflects current market yields. The yield that the interest index would produce on the issue date is 6 percent. M leases 1 floor of the office building to Corporation T, a nongovernmental person, for the term of the bonds. Under all of the facts and circumstances, T is treated as using more than 10 percent of the proceeds. Using the 6 percent yield as the discount rate, M reasonably expects on the issue date that the present value of lease payments to be made by T will be 8 percent of the present value of the total debt service on the bonds. After the issue date of the bonds, interest rates decline significantly, so that the yield on the bonds over their entire term is 4 percent. Using this actual 4 percent yield as the discount rate, the present value of lease payments made by T is 12 percent of the present value of the actual total debt service on the bonds. The bonds are not private activity bonds because M reasonably expected on the issue date that the bonds would not meet the private security or payment test and because M did not take any subsequent deliberate action to meet the private security or payment test.
(ii) The facts are the same as Example 3(i), except that 5 years after the issue date M leases a second floor to Corporation S, a nongovernmental person, under a long-term lease. Because M has taken a deliberate action, the present value of the lease payments must be computed. On the date this lease is entered into, M reasonably expects that the yield on the bonds over their entire term will be 5.5 percent, based on actual interest rates to date and the then-current rate on the variable yield bonds. M uses this 5.5 percent yield as the discount rate. Using this 5.5 percent yield as the discount rate, as a percentage of the present value of the debt service on the bonds, the present value of the lease payments made by S is 3 percent. The bonds are private activity bonds because the present value of the aggregate private payments is greater than 10 percent of the present value of debt service.
Example 4. Payments not in respect of financed property.
In order to further public safety, City Y issues tax assessment bonds the proceeds of which are used to move existing electric utility lines underground. Although the utility lines are owned by a nongovernmental utility company, that company is under noobligation to move the lines. The debt service on the bonds will be paid using assessments levied by City Y on the customers of the utility. Although the utility lines are privately owned and the utility customers make payments to the utility company for the use of those lines, the assessments are payments in respect of the cost of relocating the utility line. Thus, the assessment payments are not made in respect of property used for a private business use. Any direct or indirect payments to Y by the utility company for the undergrounding are, however, taken into account as private payments.
Example 5. Payments from users of proceeds that are not private business users taken into account.
City P issues general obligation bonds to finance the renovation of a hospital that it owns. The hospital is operated for P by D, a nongovernmental person, under a management contract that results in private business use under section 1.141-3. P will use the revenues from the hospital (after the required payments to D and the payment of operation and maintenance expenses) to pay the debt service on the bonds. The bonds meet the private security or payment test because the revenues from the hospital are payments in respect of property used for a private business use.
Example 6. Limitation of amount of payment to amount of private business use not determined annually.
City Q issues bonds with a term of 15 years and uses the proceeds to construct an office building. The debt service on the bonds is level throughout the 15-year term. Q enters into a 5-year lease with Corporation R under which R is treated as a user of 11 percent of the proceeds. R will make lease payments equal to 20 percent of the annual debt service on the bonds for each year of the lease. The present value of R’s lease payments is equal to 12 percent of the present value of the debt service over the entire 15-year term of the bonds. If, however, the lease payments taken into account as private payments were limited to 11 percent of debt service paid in each year of the lease, the present value of these payments would be only 8 percent of the debt service on the bonds over the entire term of the bonds. The bonds meet the private security or payment test, because R‘s lease payments are taken into account as private payments in an amount not to exceed 11 percent of the debt service of the bonds.
Example 7. Allocation of payments to funds not derived from a borrowing.
City Z purchases property for $1,250,000 using $1,000,000 of proceeds of its tax increment bonds and $250,000 of other revenues that are in its redevelopment fund. Within 60 days of the date of purchase, Z declared its intent to sell the property pursuant to a redevelopment plan and to use that amount to reimburse its redevelopment fund. The bonds are secured only by the incremental property taxes attributable to the increase in value of the property from the planned redevelopment of the property. Within 18 months after the issue date, Z sells the financed property to Developer M for $250,000, which Z uses to reimburse the redevelopment fund. The property that M uses is financed both with the proceeds of the bonds and Z’s redevelopment fund. The payments by M are properly allocable to the costs of property financed with the amounts in Z‘s redevelopment fund. See paragraphs (c)(3)(i) and (v) of this section.
Example 8. Allocation of payments to different sources of funding --improvements.
In 1997, City L issues bonds with proceeds of $8 million to finance the acquisition of a building. In 2002, L spends $2 million of its general revenues to improve the heating system and roof of the building. At that time, L enters into a 10-year lease with Corporation M for the building providing for annual payments of $1 million to L. The lease payments are at fair market value, and the lease payments do not otherwise have a significant nexus to either the issue or to the expenditure of general revenues. Eighty percent of each lease payment is allocated to the issue and is taken into account under the private payment test because each lease payment is properly allocated to the sources of funding in a manner that reasonably corresponds to the relative amounts of the sources of funding that are expended on the building.
Example 9. Security not provided by users of proceeds not taken into account.
County W issues certificates of participation in a lease of a building that W owns and covenants to appropriate annual payments for the lease. A portion of each payment is specified as interest. More than 10 percent of the building is used for private business use. None of the proceeds of the obligations are used with respect to the building. W uses the proceeds of the obligations to make a grant to Corporation Y for the construction of a factory that Y will own. Y makes no payments to W, directly or indirectly, for its use of proceeds, and Y has no relationship to the users of the leased building. If W defaults under the lease, the trustee for the holders of the certificates of participation has a limited right of repossession under which the trustee may not foreclose but may lease the property to a new tenant at fair market value. The obligations are secured by an interest in property used for a private business use. However, because the property is not provided by a private business user and is not financed property, the obligations do not meet the private security or payment test.
Example 10. Allocation of payments amoung issues.
University L, a political subdivision, issued three separate series of revenue bonds during 1989, 1991, and 1993 under the same bond resolution. L used the proceeds to construct facilities exclusively for its own use. Bonds issued under the resolution are equally and ratably secured and payable solely from the income derived by L from rates, fees, and charges imposed by L for the use of the facilities. The bonds issued in 1989, 1991, and 1993 are not private activity bonds. In 1997, L issues another series of bonds under the resolution to finance additional facilities. L leases 20 percent of the new facilities for the term of the 1997 bonds to nongovernmental persons who will use the facilities in their trades or businesses. The present value of the lease payments from the nongovernmental users will equal 15 percent of the present value of the debt service on the 1997 bonds. L will commingle all of the revenues from all its bond-financed facilities in its revenue fund. The present value of the portion of the lease payments from nongovernmental lessees of the new facilities allocable to the 1997 bonds under paragraph (d) of this section is less than 10 percent of the present value of the debt service on the 1997 bonds because the bond documents provide that the bonds are equally and ratably secured. Accordingly, the 1997 bonds do not meet the private security test. The 1997 bonds meet the private payment test, however, because the private lease payments for the new facility are properly allocated to those bonds (that is, because none of the proceeds of the prior issues were used for the new facilities). See paragraph (c) of this section.
Example 11. Generally applicable tax.
(i) Authority N issues bonds to finance the construction of a stadium. Under a long-term lease, Corporation X, a professional sports team, will use more than 10 percent of the stadium. X will not, however, make any payments for this private business use. The security for the bonds will be a ticket tax imposed on each person purchasing a ticket for an event at the stadium. The portion of the ticket tax attributable to tickets purchased by persons attending X’s events will, on a present value basis, exceed 10 percent of the present value of the debt service on N‘s bonds. The bonds meet the private security or payment test. The ticket tax is not a generally applicable tax and, to the extent that the tax receipts relate to X’s events, the taxes are payments in respect of property used for a private business use.
(ii) The facts are the same as Example 11(i), except that the ticket tax is imposed by N on tickets purchased for events at a number of large entertainment facilities within the N‘s jurisdiction (for example, other stadiums, arenas, and concert halls), some of which were not financed with tax-exempt bonds. The ticket tax is a generally applicable tax and therefore the revenues from this tax are not payments in respect of property used for a private business use. The receipt of the ticket tax does not cause the bonds to meet the private security or payment test.
[T.D. 8712, 62 FR 2275-2305, Jan. 16, 1997.]