California

After much watering down, a California bill to make it harder for local governments to seek bankruptcy protection cleared committee on Wednesday.

California Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill Wednesday that will allow the state to sell bonds in $25 denominations.

SAN FRANCISCO - Montebello, Calif., has won a legal victory that will allow it to sell notes to buffer its troubled finances.

LOS ANGELES - California Assembly Speaker John Perez and Sen. Alex Padilla, both Los Angeles Democrats, introduced legislation on Friday that would help fast-track a $3.1 billion pro football stadium project in downtown Los ­Angeles.

LOS ANGELES - Downey Regional Medical Center, a not-for-profit hospital located in greater Los Angeles, will emerge from bankruptcy in mid-November, allowing it to close on a planned bond refunding if a bankruptcy judge approves its exit plan.

LOS ANGELES - Arne Croce, the recently appointed interim chief administrative officer of the beleaguered city of Bell, a Los Angeles-area working class community of 50,000 residents, has his work cut out for him.

LOS ANGELES - The San Diego Association of Governments is leaning away from issuing bonds to fund the $345 million purchase of a toll road from a private operator.

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s board of directors will vote on Sept. 29 whether to issue $250 million in bonds.

Moody’s Investors Service has downgraded the long-term underlying rating on the Sacramento Transportation Authority’s variable-rate revenue bonds from to Aa3 from Aa2.

Moody’s Investors Services changed its outlook from positive to stable on $100 million of fixed-rate revenue bonds that Chapman University, a private school in Orange County, plans to issue.

LOS ANGELES - Vernon, a corruption-plagued city in greater Los Angeles, received a second chance to clean up its act when the California Legislature rejected measures that would have disincorporated the city.

The company looking to develop a National Football League stadium in Los Angeles saw two challenges crop up late last week.

SAN FRANCISCO — California Controller John Chiang has ordered an investigation of the troubled city of Hercules after uncovering what he calls major discrepancies in its financial reports.

LOS ANGELES — A high-profile bill in the California Legislature would disband the city of Vernon, handing the industrial hub and its 50,000 jobs to Los Angeles County. But county officials are increasingly uneasy about Vernon and its $511 million of bond debt.

The California's Joint Legislative Audit Committee voted Wednesday to conduct an audit of the state's hospitals to see if they meet the public benefits requirements needed to maintain their tax-exempt status.

Nearly a year after a municipal corruption scandal blew up in the Los Angeles County city of Bell, resulting in the forced resignation of top officials, new leaders say the city is beginning to take the initial steps toward fiscal health.

The Port of Oakland was able to achieve $29.2 million in present-value debt service savings by selling $345.7 million of refunding revenue bonds — the highest known level of savings achieved by the port on a refunding, officials said.

The California state auditor will investigate the controversial proposal by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission to spend $179 million of bridge toll dollars to move its office from Oakland to San Francisco.

SAN FRANCISCO — California has set Sept. 20 as the date for its first general obligation bond sale of the year and has put another on the calendar, although the size of both deals remains undecided.

SAN FRANCISCO — San Francisco International Airport will sell $450 million of refunding bonds this week in a quick follow-up to a deal earlier this summer in order to take advantage of a favorable market.