Economy

CHICAGO - The Wayne County, Mich., Airport Authority, which runs Detroit Metropolitan Airport, will come to market Thursday with $127 million of refunding bonds.

Texas Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, told a 10-member committee established to lay the groundwork for building a medical school in Austin that it is too early to know how much the proposal will cost.

A constitutional amendment to extend a $575 million Garvee road bond program won by a sizeable majority in all 75 Arkansas counties in last week’s special election.

CHICAGO - Promedica Health System will hold a retail order period Wednesday followed by institutional pricing Thursday for $145 million of refunding bonds.

Fitch Ratings assigned a AA to the Maine Health and Higher Educational Facilities Authority's $37.25 million of Series 2011C revenue bonds, which are expected to sell by negotiation this week.

The North Carolina Turnpike Authority expects to sell $220 million of state appropriation revenue bonds in a two-day sale this week.

When Jackson Laboratory of Bar Harbor, Maine, scuttled plans to establish a research facility in Florida, several other states came banging at the door of the genetics research company. Connecticut won out.

The on-again, off-again plans for an extension to a toll road that serves as an alternative to congested Interstate 5, the only freeway linking Orange County to San Diego County, looks to be back on again.

A Senate committee Wednesday voted unanimously to approve a bipartisan, $109 billion, two-year surface transportation bill that maintains current funding levels for highways and provides another $2 billion for a program that provides federal credit assistance for projects.

Standard & Poor's warned that retiree health care benefits are a growing burden for public universities.

Supervisors and workers in a signal construction unit at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's Metro-North Hudson and Harlem commuter train lines have manipulated the payroll system by abusing overtime rules that inflate their salaries and pensions, New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said in a forensic audit of overtime practices released Wednesday.

DALLAS - After issuing $1.3 billion of revenue bonds under its new special projects lien, the North Texas Tollway Authority has maintained its critical A-level ratings on its first-tier main system revenue bonds.

Wisconsin’s not-for-profit hospitals last year generated $28 billion in economic activity and provided $1.4 billion in community benefits, according to new studies.

Regional Health, the dominant health care provider in western South Dakota, will enter the market Thursday with $181 million of bonds.

Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced last week the $1 billion reconstruction of the Chicago Transit Authority’s busy Red Line.

CHICAGO - Novi, Mich.-based Trinity Health's possible acquisition of the stand-alone, 159-year-old Mercy Health System, based in Chicago, last week advanced when the two Catholic health care providers announced they had signed a nonbinding letter of intent to negotiate a union.

Moody’s Investors Service downgraded Saints Medical Center of Lowell to Caa1 from B1 after it and the for-profit Steward Health Care System of Boston ended their merger discussions.

CHICAGO - Moody's Investors Service warned Thursday that Illinois' crackdown on the property-tax exemptions of nonprofit hospitals over the amount of charity care they provide could pose a credit threat to the sector here.

SAN FRANCISCO - California's plan for a bond-funded high-speed train system just got more expensive. Fifty billion dollars more expensive.

Santa Monica planned to sell $41 million of lease-revenue bonds this week to fund renovations of a parking garage to serve the city’s downtown shopping area and to refund existing bonds.