Bonds

Gov. J.B. Pritzker on has signed Illinois’ $53.1 billion fiscal year 2025 budget, which includes $198 million for the state’s rainy day fund and $182 million for the migrant crisis as well as creating a Department of Early Childhood and an innovation center at the University of Illinois-Springfield and funding the new state-based insurance marketplace.
A 2017 constitutional challenge to Arizona’s system for funding public school facilities that spotlights districts’ unequal access to local property taxes and bond issuance finally went to trial last week.  The case, filed in Maricopa County Superior Court by school districts and others against state School Facilities Board officials, contends the funding system violates the
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee Tuesday signed a bill allowing local governments to issue bonds via industrial development corporations to work alongside the private sector to bolster affordable housing. The law will allow IDCs affiliated with cities and towns to sell bonds to raise the money needed to assure multi-family housing remains affordable. All municipal governments
A suit filed against the Palm Beach County, Florida, comptroller for his county’s investments in Israel bonds puts a state law targeting socially focused investments in the spotlight from a different direction. The lawsuit filed last week against Palm Beach County Clerk and Comptroller Joseph Abruzzo cites a law Florida’s Republican government passed last year
A California Senate committee received few details from the department charged with building a public broadband program on its plans to expand into underserved neighborhoods. The program faced criticism last year for prioritizing upscale cities, like Beverly Hills, over impoverished and middle-class areas, such as Los Angeles’ South Central region and Oakland, communities lacking in
States are casting around for solutions to a drop in gas tax revenues which includes hiked registration fees and the expansion of toll roads, which remains politically sensitive.  “Various projections from state DOTs, think tanks, and economists show that gas tax revenue, which is the largest source of revenue for state transportation trust funds, is
Wood-pellet manufacturer Enviva Inc.’s bankruptcy has pushed $353 million of municipal bonds along with a wider $2.6 billion pot of debt into a Chapter 11 corporate reorganization. The municipal bonds are the $252 million in outstanding Series 2022 Industrial Development Authority of Sumter County Exempt Facilities revenue bonds in Alabama and $101 million in outstanding
Texas Capital is starting a public finance business in Texas, hiring a former UBS Financial Services investment banker, the company announced Wednesday. The move by the Dallas-based financial services firm comes as the ranks of underwriters in Texas have thinned under state laws that prohibit contracts with companies that “boycott” or “discriminate” against the fossil
How much the federal government can contribute to rebuilding the originally bond-financed Francis Scott Key Bridge is now a concern for the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.  “Hours after the collapse, President Biden announced his intention for the federal government to pay for the entire cost of reconstructing the Key Bridge,” said Committee Chair