Ted Phillips

A New York judge ruled last week that opponents of the Atlantic Yards development in Brooklyn will be able to reargue their case that the Empire State Development Corp. violated the state’s environmental quality review act.

The New York City Industrial Development Agency board last week voted against a resolution to terminate a wage study after several board members questioned the researchers’ objectivity.

New York’s pension fund posted an 8.01% positive return in the second quarter of the fiscal year, the state comptroller’s office reported last week.

Some of the people named to New York Governor-elect Andrew Cuomo’s transition team on Thursday are familiar names to the municipal bond industry.

The New York Municipal Bond Bank Agency plans to market $50.7 million of bonds on behalf of five counties next week in its third pooled offering utilizing stimulus programs.

The state-appointed receiver who took over governing Central Falls, R.I., has appointed a “state receiver’s council” to take over from the elected City Council, state officials announced Tuesday.

The New York City Capital Resource Corp. gave final approval Tuesday to the issuance of $19.7 million of recovery zone facility bonds for a Harlem hotel as it tries to get deals out the door before the program expires at the end of this year.

Public bus service in Nassau County, N.Y., could be privatized after talks on Monday between the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the county executive produced no resolution in a funding dispute.

Requiring local government employees and retirees in New York to pay a share of health insurance premiums could save more than $1 billion annually, according to a think tank report released Monday.

Higher spending and lower revenues than anticipated in New York have created a $315 million mid-year budget gap, the state Division of Budget said in a midyear report last week.

Nassau County, N.Y., received its first rating downgrade in a decade last week as it prepared to market and remarket at least $463 million of general obligation debt.

Fitch Ratings on Wednesday downgraded to junk $792 million of bonds issued in 1997 by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to build a terminal at John F. Kennedy International Airport.

The New York City Municipal Water Finance Authority plans to market $500 million of taxable Build America Bonds on its subordinate lien on Tuesday.

New York Republican Comptroller candidate Harry Wilson said in an interview last month that he worked on a bond transaction with the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power but declined to discuss it. The department could not confirm that Wilson had worked on a deal.

Investors in bonds that financed parking facilities serving Yankee Stadium are currently reviewing the budget of the fiscally troubled nonprofit that runs the lots, after being asked to waive debt-service coverage covenants.

New York City ended fiscal 2010 on June 30 with a $5 million general fund surplus, according to the comprehensive annual financial report released Friday by the city comptroller’s office.

New York State Homes and Community Renewal last week approved $250 million of bonds for affordable housing developments across the state.

Sales tax collections by New York municipalities rose by 10.5% during the first three quarters of 2010, Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli reported last week. During the same period last year, sales tax collections declined 9%.

The New York Power Authority last week approved up to $220 million of bonds to finance an upgrade to a hydroelectric power facility and to refund outstanding debt.

New York voters next week will decide whether a politician or a businessman should be the state’s comptroller.