Far West

WASHINGTON – Capping the tax exemption for municipal bonds over a nine-year period would have cost state and local governments roughly $175 billion in additional borrowing costs, while a full repeal would have cost them nearly $500 billion more, state and local officials warned Tuesday.

Citigroup Global Markets Inc. scrapped the closing on $377.6 million in revenue and general obligation bonds it priced for El Camino Hospital in northern California after the U.S. Justice Department subpoenaed documents from the hospital.

The California Supreme Court has agreed to hear an appeal of a landmark pension decision that analysts and reformers had hailed as a positive for the state and local governments.

The District of Columbia next week will issue $577.6 million in general obligation bonds partly to finance projects under the district's capital improvements plan.

Time has run out on California lawmakers’ efforts to pass new transportation funding legislation in 2016, a sharp turnaround from the optimism that local government groups had expressed only a few days ago.

S&P Global Ratings analysts said new California’s law emphasis on debt management policies could bode well for issuer’s credit quality.

Late vote counts in California appear to have swung another seven ballot measures into the win column.

California issuers won’t face most new disclosure requirements until 2018 under a new law that takes effect in January.

Worrisome signs remain for the Oregon economy ahead of Gov. Kate Brown's budget proposal Dec. 1, necessitating some cuts the state’s chief executive said.

Republicans this week said they are working toward a continuing resolution to fund the federal government through March 31 instead of a full-year appropriations bill, a decision that disappointed Democrats and several GOP members.