BATON ROUGE- Louisiana has a bit more wiggle room to borrow money next year for state-financed construction projects.

  

Recent debt refinancing, along with better-than-expected terms for a recent bond sale has lessened the constraints for borrowing in the upcoming budget year that begins July 1. That's the word delivered from financial analysts Thursday to the Bond Commission.

  

The state is limited by a debt cap, and has been hovering close to it - with the risk that it wouldn't be able to borrow money at all next year under the traditional structure the state uses.

  

State officials learned Thursday they won't have that problem and could borrow an estimated $225 million next year under the regular debt structure.

  

That's not enough, however, to keep up with the planned list of construction work.