Caitlin Devitt

Fitch Ratings this week downgraded Marquette, a continuing-care retirement community located north of Indianapolis, to BBB from A-minus.

CHICAGO — Detroit-based Miller, Canfield, Paddock and Stone PLC, Michigan’s top bond counsel firm, has tapped long-time public finance attorney Amanda Van Dusen to lead the public finance group.

Triple-A rated Columbus, Ohio, saved around $23 million over 20 years by issuing $192 million of Build America Bonds instead of traditional tax-exempt debt last November, the city’s longtime auditor estimated.

CHICAGO — Cook County, Ill.’s plan to issue $332 million of new-money debt advanced last week after a key board committee signed off on the borrowing.

CHICAGO — Private-equity group Cerberus Capital Management LP yesterday said it would buy Boston’s nonprofit Cerberus Christi Health Care for $830 million, taking over the Catholic system’s long-term debt and spending $400 million on capital upgrades.

CHICAGO — The Indianapolis market will gain six new public finance attorneys following the merger this month between Cleveland, Ohio-based law firm Benesch Friedlander Coplan & Aronoff LLP and longtime local firm Dann Pecar Newman & Kleiman PC.

The start date of a long-planned commuter line between Ann Arbor and Detroit has been postponed due to lack of funding.

An effort to set up a new casino in Fruitport Township located in Muskegon County advanced this week when Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians announced reaching a preliminary agreement on the proposal.

Fitch Ratings placed the Detroit Medical Center’s revenue bonds on positive watch and affirmed its BB rating Monday after a for-profit health care system announced it was interested in taking over the state’s largest charity care hospital.

CHICAGO — South Dakota lawmakers will attempt to hash out a final $4 billion budget for fiscal 2011 next week after suspending debate earlier this month to see if the state would receive up to $36 million in federal stimulus money that could be used to eliminate a deficit that’s roughly the same size.

CHICAGO — The directors of two of Indiana’s largest borrowers have left for new jobs.

CHICAGO — Detroit Mayor Dave Bing said he was “elated” by Friday’s announcement that a for-profit health care system is interested in buying the Detroit Medical Center — Michigan’s largest charity-care provider — and infusing $800 million into the center’s Detroit campus.

CHICAGO — Nonprofit health care providers continue to grapple with fallout from the collapse of the auction-rate market, and the sector now faces up to $31.5 billion of bank-credit-supported debt that needs to be renewed by 2013, according to a new report by BMO Capital Markets.

CHICAGO — The Indiana Finance Authority has advanced a pair of transactions that will launch the state’s first use of its $3.1 billion Midwestern disaster-area bond allocation to help redevelopment efforts following damaging storms two years ago.

CHICAGO — The Indiana General Assembly last weekend wrapped up its session with some major highlights, authorizing the privatization of two of the state's largest infrastructure projects and moving to preserve recent property tax caps by making them part of the state constitution.

Fitch Ratings this week revised its outlook to negative and affirmed its BBB-plus rating on general obligation debt issued by the Cleveland Municipal School District. The action affects $150.3 million of GOs issued in 2002 and 2004.

A Korean battery maker said it would build a $303 million plant to make electric car batteries in the town of Holland.

Officials at the Livonia Public Schools in Wayne County are considering privatizing the district's custodial staff, bus drivers, and food service workers in an effort to offset an expected deficit of nearly $15 million in this year's $140 million budget.

CHICAGO — The Ohio Building Authority today will price approximately $80 million of revenue bonds in a deal that includes traditional tax-exempt debt and taxable Build America Bonds.

CHICAGO — With a pledge by Michigan backing up the debt, below-investment-grade Detroit yesterday captured interest rates ranging from 2.47% to 5.375% on $250 million of distributable state aid limited-tax general obligation bonds.