Yvette was a senior reporter, covering the Midwest. She earned a bachelors in journalism from Columbia College Chicago, began her reporting career at the storied City News Bureau of Chicago, and joined the Bond Buyer in 1997 leading Midwest coverage from her hometown Chicago.
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Law firms interested in working on future state of Wisconsin bond sales have until August 6 to submit their qualifications for review.
July 18 -
Top-rated Washington University in St. Louis will sell about $200 million of taxable new-money and refunding bonds on Wednesday,
July 17 - Ohio
Louisville-based Hilliard Lyons is extending its public finance banking reach into Ohio with the hiring of former RBC Capital Markets banker Scott Stubbins.
July 17 - Minnesota
Minnesota closed out fiscal 2012 on June 30 with $336 million more in revenue than predicted when the annual February forecast was released.
July 17 -
Moody's Investors Service earlier this month downgraded Chicago's $578 million of sales tax-backed bonds to Aa3 from Aa2, due primarily to a lack of legal separation between the pledged sales tax revenues and the city's general operations.
July 17 -
Fitch Ratings raised the Rush University Medical Center Obligated Group one notch to A in recognition of its consistently strong profitability and the completion of its new patient tower, eliminating construction risks on the credit.
July 17 - Illinois
Rising tax revenues helped Illinois chip away at the unpaid obligations on its books going into the new fiscal year July 1 but the number remained at a staggering $7.5 billion to $8 billion, Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka reports.
July 16 - Minnesota
Minneapolis-based Northland Securities Inc. has hired veteran municipal professional James Kubik to help lead its expansion in the central states region.
July 13 - Indiana
Indianapolis-based City Securities Corp. has hired former Raymond James/Morgan Keegan banker and group manager Linda Matkowski to manage its public finance banking team as the 86-year-old firm seeks to expand its reach deeper into the Midwest.
July 13 -
Nearly three-quarters of the tobacco settlement bonds rated by Moody's Investors Service will default if smokers keep up their current pace of kicking or cutting back on their habit, the agency warns in a new report.
July 12 -
Illinois-based Hospital Sisters Services, Inc. is gearing up to sell more than $400 million of new-money and refunding bonds this fall as it undertakes various upgrades to existing facilities and opens a replacement critical access hospital.
July 11 -
IllinoisWith a $500 million new-money issue in the works, Moody's Investors slapped the Chicago Public Schools with a downgrade and warned of further negative action due to mounting fiscal challenges and the district's plan to dig deeply into reserves as a budget fix.
July 11 -
A retired state judge has filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a new Illinois law that overhauls the state's retiree healthcare program and shifting more of the funding burden for premiums to beneficiaries.
July 10 -
Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signed several pieces of legislation authorizing $1.6 billion in new state borrowing to finance transportation and transit projects and extending an increase in the Regional Transportation Authority of Illinois' working cash notes limits.
July 10 -
Top Illinois finance officials are on the road to sell institutional investors on the tidy structure of the state's sale issue next week of $1.5 billion of double-A rated unemployment bonds that are insulated against the state's well-publicized liquidity and budget struggles.
July 10 - Minnesota
Moody's Investors Service downgraded Hennepin County, Minn.'s first lien sales tax revenue bond credit to Aa1 from Aaa in connection with the agency's new rating methodology for debt backed by special tax revenues.
July 10 -
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has submitted his nominations for the new Chicago Infrastructure Trust to the City Council.
July 10 - Illinois
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Cook County Board of Commissioners President Toni Preckwinkle announced that $33 million in savings were achieved in the first year of collaboration on some services and initiatives.
July 10 - Missouri
Top-rated Missouri - a rare borrower - will take competitive bids this summer on two refunding deals that will achieve significant present-value savings and provide $44 million in fiscal 2013 budget relief.
July 9 - Illinois
The financially-strapped Chicago Public Schools system released a $5.2 billion proposed budget for fiscal 2013 that closes a $665 million gap with a property tax hike, operating cuts, and by digging deeply into reserves and draining its unreserved fund balance.
July 6
