The Text

The legislature may provide means and authority whereby any state debt or debts, or any portion or combination thereof, may be refunded in accordance with the following provisions:
1. State debts may be refunded at any time after they are incurred provided that the state will achieve a debt service savings on a present value basis as a result of the refunding transaction, and further provided that no maturity shall be called for redemption unless the privilege to pay prior to the maturity date was reserved to the state. The legislature may provide for the method of computation of present value for such purpose.
2. In no event shall refunding obligations be issued in an amount exceeding that necessary to provide sufficient funds to accomplish the refunding of the obligations to be refunded including paying all costs and expenses related to the refunding transaction and, in no event, shall the proceeds of refunding obligations be applied to any purpose other than accomplishing the refunding of the debt to be refunded and paying costs and expenses related to the refunding.
3. Proceeds of refunding obligations shall be deposited in escrow funds which shall be maintained and managed by the state comptroller or by an agent or trustee designated by the state comptroller and no legislative appropriation shall be required for disbursement of money, or income earned thereon, from such escrow funds for the purposes enumerated in this section.
4. Refunding obligations may be refunded pursuant to this section.
5. Refunding obligations shall either be paid in annual installments or annual contributions shall be made to a sinking fund in amounts sufficient to retire the refunding obligations at their maturity. No annual installments or contributions of principal need be made with respect to all or any portion of an issue of refunding obligations in years when debt service on such refunding obligations or portion thereof is paid or contributed entirely from an escrow fund created pursuant to subdivision 3 of this section or in years when no installments or contributions would have been due on the obligations to be refunded. So long as any of the refunding obligations remain outstanding, installments or contributions shall be made in any years that installments or contributions would have been due on the obligations to be refunded.
6. In no event shall the last annual installment or contribution on any portion of refunding debt, including refunding obligations issued to refund other refunding obligations, be made after the termination of the period of probable life of the projects financed with the proceeds of the relevant portion of the debt to be refunded, or any debt previously refunded with the refunding obligations to be refunded, determined as of the date of issuance of the original obligations pursuant to section 12 of this article to finance such projects, or forty years from such date, if earlier; provided, however, that in lieu of the foregoing, an entire refunding issue or portion thereof may be structured to mature over the remaining weighted average useful life of all projects financed with the obligations being refunded.
7. Subject to the provisions of subdivision 5 of this section, each annual installment or contribution of principal of refunding obligations shall be equal to the amount that would be required by subdivision 1 of section 12 of this article if such installments or contributions were required to be made from the year that the next installment or contribution would have been due on the obligations to be refunded, if they had not been refunded, until the final maturity of the refunding obligations but excluding any year in which no installment or contribution would have been due on the obligations to be refunded or, in the alternative, the total payments of principal and interest on the refunding bonds shall be less in each year to their final maturity than the total payments of principal and interest on the bonds to be refunded in each such year.
8. The provisions of subdivision 3 and subdivisions 7 through 9 of section 12 of this article shall apply to sinking funds created pursuant to this section for the payment at maturity of refunding obligations.