California

SACRAMENTO — The California Debt Limit Allocation Committee this week assigned $530 million of private-activity bond volume cap for construction of a water desalination plant in San Diego County.

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.

SAN FRANCISCO — A California Senate committee has approved a bill designed to clear up legal concerns that have prevented the issuance of more than $770 million of qualified school construction bonds.

SAN FRANCISCO — Get cracking on the budget. Or California faces another ugly cash crisis.

SAN FRANCISCO — California’s East Bay Municipal Utility District plans to issue more than $1 billion of debt over the first half of this year, as it continues to deal with the fallout from the financial crisis and seeks to take advantage of low interest rates and subsidies that the ­federal government has used to respond to the crisis.

Standard & Poor’s downgrade of California last week raises a crucial question: does the Golden State’s debt at some point become no longer appropriate for conservative retail investors?

SAN FRANCISCO — Efforts in California to develop community choice aggregation as an alternative path to public power have been slow to get off the ground.

SAN FRANCISCO — The San Diego County Water Authority, California’s third-largest urban water agency, this week plans to price $639 million of water revenue bonds, including its first Build America Bonds.

SAN FRANCISCO — The often contentious relationship between California and its local governments appears to be ­heading back to the electoral battlefield this year.

Matt Dalton is willing to buy the debt of a bankrupt borrower — and he can’t find any for sale at a suitable price.

Only in municipal bonds.Matt Dalton is willing to buy the debt of a bankrupt borrower — and he can’t find any for sale at a suitable price.

California Treasurer Bill Lockyer will have an opponent in November.

The Bay Area Toll Authority’s oversight committee on Wednesday approved toll hikes on the seven state owned toll bridges in the San Francisco Area. The toll hikes must now be approved by the Oakland-based agency’s full board.

SAN FRANCISCO — Citing California’s “severe” budget imbalance and the likely reappearance of cash-flow problems, Standard & Poor’s yesterday downgraded the state’s general obligation bond rating to A-minus from A. The agency continues to assign a negative outlook.

SAN FRANCISCO — Not only is California facing a huge budget deficit, but lawmakers and the governor have a very short time to fix it to keep things from getting farther out of balance, the state’s independent Legislative Analyst’s Office reported Tuesday.

SAN FRANCISCO — Los Angeles County, the nation’s largest, may be forced to make deep budget cuts to balance its fiscal 2010-2011 general fund budget in the face of new state budget cuts and continued weakness in revenue collections, officials said Tuesday.

SAN FRANCISCO — The builders of what they say will be the biggest water desalination plant in the nation are now slated to ask for more than one-half billion dollars of private-activity bond allocation by the end of the month.

SACRAMENTO — California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger unveiled his initial fiscal 2011 budget proposal Friday, asking for almost $7 billion in federal funds to help close a budget hole in the $20 billion range.

SACRAMENTO — California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger unveiled his initial fiscal 2011 budget proposal today, which calls for “external borrowing” as part of plans to manage cash flow as the state attempts to close a hole of almost $20 billion.

SAN FRANCISCO — After putting an optimistic spin on his final state of the state address Wednesday, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will address the grim specifics of the state’s budget today, unveiling his formal proposal to close a general fund gap pegged at almost $20 billion over the next 18 months.