Harrisburg Mayor Linda Thompson will apply to Act 47, Pennsylvania’s distressed municipality program, as the city has $282 million of outstanding incinerator bonds that it cannot pay.
Thompson and Gov. Edward Rendell will hold a joint press conference at city hall on Friday at noon to announce that Harrisburg is applying to the state’s Department of Community and Economic Development to enter into Act 47.
The move is being spurred by the outstanding incinerator debt and an ongoing dispute between Thompson and members of the City Council about the best way to resolve the situation.
The Act 47 application was first reported by The Patriot-News.
A Harrisburg official said that entering into Act 47 would not require approval from the City Council, which rejected Thompson’s plan Tuesday to have Scott Balice Strategies craft a debt-restructuring plan for the city.
