Columbia to Take $22 Million Loan To Finish Projects

Columbia University will soon take out a $22-million dollar loan to finance completion of current construction projects, a university spokesman said yesterday.

Bruce Bassett, vice president for fiscal management at Columbia, said yesterday that Columbia will obtain the unrestricted loan in place of a bond issue that the university had been asking since last spring. The present bond market makes bond issues "impractical," he said.

Financing

The loan is expected to provide financing for several Columbia projects, including the Sherman Fairchild Center for the Life Sciences and the Augustus Long Medical Library-Health Sciences Center.

Bassett said Columbia needs the loan because its $13.5 million general purpose unrestricted endowment is decreasing. He said that Columbia will "hopefully be able to pay back" the loan when it is due in four years with "previously pledged monies held up until then."

Harvard Treasurer George Putnam '49 said yesterday that loan programs are often the "most economical" way to finance construction and long range projects.

Harvard has taken out loans for the construction of Mission Hill housing and the Medical School power plant, Putnam said.