Illinois

Illinois plans to hit the market in the coming months with $3.5 billion to $4 billion of borrowing in three deals.

The Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority of Illinois has selected a finance team as it gears up to enter the market with a big refunding to take advantage of a favorable market.

A group of seven Illinois safety-net hospitals last week unveiled several measures they said could trim $1.4 billion from the state’s Medicaid expenses and eliminate the need for the deeper cuts that Gov. Pat Quinn has requested.

Moody’s Investors Service has signaled that the junk-level rating on MJH Education Assistance Illinois IV LLC’s student housing revenue bonds for the Fullerton Village Project has stabilized by revising the outlook to stable from negative on the senior-lien bonds.

The Illinois Coalition to Protect the Public Commons, a group that opposes public asset privatization, last week announced its concerns over Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s proposal to establish an infrastructure trust bank that would leverage private investment in public projects.

CHICAGO — Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn on Monday tapped his budget director David Vaught to lead the state' economic development efforts and named senior adviser Jerry Stermer to serve as Vaught' temporary replacement.

Chicago has requested a federal extension until the end of the year to decide whether to attempt to privatize Midway Airport, a move that preserves the city's ability to resurrect a lease deal that could generate several billion dollars in up-front cash.

Honing in on infrastructure investment to revitalize Chicago's landscape and economy, Mayor Rahm Emanuel put a price tag of $7.3 billion on public works projects planned over the next four years and pressed airlines to support a fourth new runway at O'Hare International Airport.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service closed an audit without taking any enforcement action on $600 million of Build America Bonds issued by the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago that some market observers claimed had been mispriced.

CHICAGO — Chicago Public Schools must close an up to $700 million shortfall in its next budget with a more than $1 billion deficit looming in 2014 due to mounting operational, pension and debt service costs amid dwindling federal funds.

Illinois borrowed $4 billion last year to fund capital projects and cover its fiscal 2011 pension payment, putting it among the ranks of top issuers, but its issuance levels actually marked a sharp drop from 2010, when the state flooded the market with $8.7 billion of paper in nine deals.

Standard & Poor’s last week revised the outlook on Governors State University’s A-minus to stable from negative, due in part to the Illinois school’s demonstrated ability to manage cash flow and operations and make timely debt service payments, despite chronic delays in state aid.

CHICAGO — Bids to buy the assets of an upscale continuing-care retirement community in downtown Chicago are due by April 10, with holders of its $229 million of debt hoping for a competitive auction that results in a better recovery rate than the pennies on the dollar offered by an initial bidder.

With public ire over the former mayor's flawed $1.15 billion lease of Chicago's parking meter system still clouding the local political landscape for public private partnerships, the city is turning to a next-generation model as it eyes private dollars to fund infrastructure and lower the cost of some city services.

Holders of $229 million of debt issued for a now-bankrupt upscale continuing care retirement community in downtown Chicago would recoup just pennies on the dollar under an initial bid for the facility.

CHICAGO — The Illinois Finance Authority board on Tuesday advanced direct-purchase issues for two health care refunding deals and an $11 million allocation of Midwestern Disaster Area Bonds, the latest in a series of projects to tap the federal program before it expires at the end of the year.

CHICAGO — Local governments in Cook County, Ill., have raised property taxes nearly 50% during the last 10 years, mostly to keep pace with growing pension and employment benefits, and are moving along an "unsustainable" path that could eventually force some into bankruptcy, a Chicago-based public policy group warns in a new report.

The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board approved Northwestern Memorial Hospital’s new $300 million, 1-million square-foot outpatient facility. The hospital hopes to complete the project by 2014. The building at the hospital’s main downtown Chicago campus will also house doctors’ offices.

Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn on Tuesday announced state funding of $32 million for the construction of a new transportation-related education center at the City Colleges of Chicago’s Olive-Harvey campus.

After it courts buyers at an investor conference set for late next month, Chicago plans to offer up more than $3 billion of new-money and refunding general obligation water revenue and airport debt.