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The Tucson Unified School District has hired a new financial adviser to handle its bond issues, just days after the district severed ties with its previous financial adviser.

Superintendent Roger Pfeuffer is confident Stone & Youngberg, LLC, a California-based financial adviser with clients across the country, will be able to leverage low interest rates, refinance TUSD bonds when necessary and maintain the bonds' tax rates.

"Basically, our intent is to get the best bang for the taxpayers' buck," Pfeuffer said.

TUSD soon plans to issue $47 million in bonds from 2004's $235 million bond plan to continue various school-improvement projects.

Representatives from Stone & Youngberg's Phoenix office did not return calls this week.

TUSD's governing board unanimously voted on July 24 to set aside a five-year contract with First Southwest Co., TUSD's financial adviser since 2003, and seek a new financial adviser.

There was one year left in the contract, but district officials and attorneys were concerned about First Southwest's connection to a federal corruption investigation in El Paso.

They believed they'd have to disclose that connection in pursuing bond issues, which they feared could negatively affect interest rates.

First Southwest did not returned repeated calls from the Arizona Daily Star, but in a letter delivered to the paper Wednesday, the company says it is a victim in the corruption case. The company refused to pay a bribe to maintain its financial-adviser contract with El Paso County, according to a document filed in a federal court in April.

As the investigation is ongoing, little has been publicly disclosed about First Southwest's role, if any, in the federal corruption case. In his letter to the Star, Jack Addams, the company's managing director and head of public finance, said federal officials have not asked the company for information concerning the case.

Along with the upcoming bond issuance, Pfeuffer said Stone & Youngberg will assist TUSD with a possible 2008 budget override and another bond vote, if attempted, in 2011 or 2012.

Pfeuffer and TUSD Finance Director Pat Beatty also have selected Citigroup and Peacock, Hislop, Staley & Given, Inc., as new underwriters for the bond, replacing Bear Sterns, TUSD's previous underwriter.