The fourth UConn 2000 bond issue, worth about $80 million, will be offered for retail sale March 26-29, Wilbur Jones, UConn's vice president for business affairs and finance, announced last week.

During the retail order period, anyone can purchase the bonds, which are sold in denominations of $5,000. Bonds not sold during the retail trading period will be sold to institutional investors, says Jones.

Since the advent of UConn 2000, a program believed to have helped attract thousands of new students and top scholars and faculty to the campus, brokers have sold more than $300 million in University of Connecticut general obligation bonds to finance UConn 2000 projects.

Among the projects financed to date by bond sales are the new chemistry building, a new heating and cooling plant, the new downtown Stamford Campus and the North Parking Garage. Also during that period, workers have converted Fairfield Road to a pedestrian mall, and started the first phase of construction on new buildings for the physics and biology departments, the Marine Sciences Institute at Avery Point, and the agricultural biotechnology building. UConn also has bought a building at the Waterbury campus.

The bonds, which are issued by the University and backed by the state, also have financed nearly $40 million in renovations and classroom reconstruction, as well as the purchase of more than $46 million of equipment purchases and library acquisitions.

Special obligation revenue bonds, which were issued and liquidated solely by the University, were sold to finance construction of South Campus.

The UConn 2000 program, signed into law in 1995, will total more than $1 billion, including a matching endowment program, during the course of 10 years. Currently, new buildings for the schools of pharmacy and business, a renovated and expanded student union, a variety of renovation projects to several residence hall complexes, and more renovations to academic buildings and equipment purchases are slated to occur during the second phase of the program.

Funding for the additions to the School of Fine Arts, a new central warehouse, and the Student Recreational Facility were in the form of State of Connecticut general obligation bonds outside the UConn 2000 program. The new UConn Foundation Building, being built adjacent to the Centennial Alumni House, is privately financed.

Richard Veilleux