Far West

SAN FRANCISCO — Oregon voters approved $727 million of tax hikes Tuesday, keeping the state’s budget balanced amid a sharp economic contraction.

WASHINGTON — Build America Bonds will cost $26 billion more over the next 10 years than previously estimated, the Congressional Budget Office said in a report issued yesterday.

WASHINGTON — The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board today will begin soliciting a broad range of nominees to serve on its board amid signs that Congress is likely to soon require the self-regulator to alter its composition so that a majority of its 15 members are “public” officials.

The National Association of Bond Lawyers yesterday released a long-awaited advisory on the federal securities law issues that arise when stripping tax credits from underlying taxable municipal bonds.

SAN FRANCISCO — Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle, in her final state of the state address Monday, called for a beefed-up rainy-day fund and a bond program to help property owners finance clean-energy systems and energy-efficiency upgrades.

MINNEAPOLIS — The highway trust fund will face another funding crisis by August, House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee chairman James Oberstar warned at a town hall here yesterday.

Dan Gallagher, deputy director of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s trading and markets division, plans to leave at the end of the week to become a partner at WilmerHale here.

WASHINGTON — North Carolina securities regulators plan this week to begin work on a centralized auction-rate securities research center that will collect progress reports on how Wall Street and other dealer firms are fulfilling the “best effort” commitments they made to provide liquidity to institutional investors still holding illiquid ARS.

SAN ANTONIO — Legislation recently introduced in Congress suggests that traditional tax-credit bonds may be replaced by bonds offering Build America Bond-style direct subsidies to issuers, an Internal Revenue Service attorney said last week.

SAN FRANCISCO — The California Supreme Court Monday tossed out felony charges against five of the six San Diego officials charged with violating state conflict-of-interest laws in connection with decisions they made that led to underfunding of the city employee pension fund.