Washington

Senate Banking Committee chairman Christopher Dodd, who said Friday he plans to move forward with a massive financial regulatory reform bill without Republican support, told federal regulators that he wants the bill to include language that would give the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board oversight of pension fund placement agents.

The District of Columbia does not have any additional debt capacity and risks exceeding its self-imposed 12% debt-to-expenditures cap in fiscal 2011 unless about $350 million of its outstanding fixed-rate bonds are refunded, officials told members of the District Council Friday.

WASHINGTON — The National Association of Bond Lawyers yesterday joined the growing chorus of muni market groups pushing for an extension beyond the end of 2010 of two provisions in last year’s $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act allowing banks to purchase tax-exempt bonds from issuers that otherwise might not have access to the market.

WASHINGTON — The House yesterday cleared legislation that would increase the debt limit by $1.9 billion to $14.3 trillion.

WASHINGTON — New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, joined by Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, has filed charges against Bank of America, its former chief executive officer Kenneth Lewis, and its former chief financial officer Joseph Price for allegedly duping shareholders and the federal government to facilitate a merger with Merrill Lynch.

The federal government expects to recoup through taxes most of the subsidies it pays on Build America Bonds, according to the federal budget released this week.

WASHINGTON — Senate Democrats yesterday said they plan on Monday to take up the first of a series of jobs bills, which will include expansion of the Build America Bonds and TIGER grant programs, an extension of the transportation law, and transportation and water infrastructure funding.

WASHINGTON — Carla A. Young, a former Internal Revenue Service lawyer who worked on municipal bonds, has joined the law firm of Greenberg Traurig LLP as a shareholder in its Washington, D.C., and Tysons Corner, Va., offices, the firm announced yesterday.

WASHINGTON — The Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday announced that William Hicks, who worked on a key muni case, has been named associate regional director of enforcement for the Atlanta regional office and that Rhea Kemble Dignam has been named director of the office.

Senate Democrats plan to unveil a “jobs agenda” as early as this morning that would extend surface transportation programs for a year, expand the Build America Bonds program, and augment the popular TIGER discretionary transportation grant program.

Issuer groups pushing for the Senate Banking Committee to add language in financial regulatory reform legislation mandating that municipal securities be rated on the same scale as other kinds of debt are getting a boost from an unlikely source: the Service Employees International Union, one of the largest labor unions in the country.

WASHINGTON — The current Build America Bond program is costing the federal government roughly three-quarters of a billion dollars a year, according to the Obama administration’s recently released budget documents.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board has made some key additions to its senior management, hiring Amy Schabacker Dufrane as its chief administrative and human resources officer and promoting Al Morisato as its chief information officer.

Municipal infrastructure market participants believe that insufficient funding and the politicization of infrastructure are worse impediments to investments than corruption, earmark abuses, public policy instability, or poor creditworthiness of public authorities, according to a recent survey by KPMG LLP.

SAN FRANCISCO — Add ­Washington to the list of states worrying about ­liquidity.

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration would like to make the Build America Bonds program permanent at a lower, so-called revenue-neutral subsidy rate, but the remainder of the proposed fiscal 2011 budget does not include any proposals to extend other stimulus programs due to expire at the end of the year.

WASHINGTON — President Obama in his fiscal 2011 budget yesterday proposed a $4 billion infrastructure bank to fund or finance worthwhile transportation projects.

WASHINGTON — The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board is exploring whether to raise the fees it charges market participants, including for subscriptions to market data it collects.

WASHINGTON — President Obama is proposing $1.26 billion of spending authority for the Securities and Exchange Commission in fiscal 2011, a 12% jump over the $1.11 billion that the administration projects Congress will make available to the SEC for the current fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30.

WASHINGTON — President Obama’s fiscal 2011 budget, released yesterday, estimates a $1.267 trillion deficit, or 8.3% of gross domestic product, and proposes raising taxes on wealthy Americans that could boost demand for tax-exempt municipal bonds.