Economy

Elk Grove Village last week announced it would drop its long-standing opposition and legal challenge to Chicago’s $7.5 billion expansion of O’Hare International Airport.

While Albany lawmakers continue to debate a financial rescue plan for New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority, agency officials yesterday announced an additional $621 million shortfall for fiscal 2009, bringing the deficit to $1.8 billion.

DALLAS - Louisiana will issue at least $303.5 million of 35-year, second-lien gasoline and fuel tax bonds this week in a negotiated sale that will benefit the state's ongoing $5.2 billion transportation program.

The Maryland Department of Transportation expects to competitively sell $110 million of revenue transportation bonds on Wednesday.

WASHINGTON — Transportation stakeholders are urging increased support from the Department of Transportation for state and local governments and railroads to take advantage of a rail financing program that provides low-interest federal loans and credit for infrastructure projects and debt refinancing.

Keeping Massachusetts’ main east-west roadway in a state of good repair will cost $544 million through 2017, according to a recent review of the 123-mile Western Turnpike.

DALLAS - The Dallas County Hospital District will not issue for at least a year any of the $747 million of voter-authorized bonds that will finance most of a $1.27 billion project to replace county-owned Parkland Hospital.

The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority's coffers may run dry by June 30 due to unforeseen infrastructure needs and an 8% dip in traffic on the Metropolitan Highway System in March.

The Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority is experiencing severe budget constraints affecting operations, and sales tax revenues dedicated to paying debt service are down.

April is proving to be a busy month for bonds in Nassau County, N.Y.

Standard & Poor’s said it would maintain its A rating and stable outlook on Fargo-based MeritCare Health System after it was forced to evacuate all patients and workers from one of its hospitals due to rising floodwaters in the Red River.

DALLAS - The North Texas Tollway Authority is considering issuing as much as $500 million of taxable Build America Bonds in June, though discussions are very preliminary, officials say.

CHICAGO - Moody's Investors Service yesterday said it would develop a new set of liquidity measures to take into account when examining the credit profiles of universities, hospitals, and other nonprofit groups.

Standard & Poor’s last week revised its outlook to negative from stable on St. Louis-based SSM Health Care’s AA-minus rating on $1 billion of debt due to ongoing economic strains on its balance sheet.

DALLAS - Arkansas Children's Hospital will finance more than half the cost of a $121 million expansion to its Little Rock facility with an upcoming negotiated sale of $100 million of revenue bonds by Pulaski County.

CHICAGO - Chicago's $2.52 billion groundbreaking agreement to lease Midway Airport to a private consortium under a federal pilot program was canceled yesterday over the group's inability to raise financing for the 99-year transaction amid the ongoing international credit crunch.

The New York State Senate Democratic majority offered a new rescue package for the cash-strapped Metropolitan Transportation Authority late Monday. The proposal would raise $1.76 billion annually, which includes debt service on $1.2 billion of bonds that would finance road, bridge and rail projects in upstate New York and Long Island, Austin Shafran, spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith, D-Queens, said. The proposal would eliminate service cuts and reduce fare and toll yield hikes to 8% from the 23% the MTA board approved last month, Shafran said.

John McGee, chief financial officer of the Arizona Department of Transportation, said last week that public-private partnerships could help solve at least part of the state’s transportation funding problem.

Standard & Poor’s last week raised $4.8 billion of outstanding New Jersey Turnpike Authority revenue bonds to A-plus from A. The outlook is stable.

CHICAGO - Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn on Friday named prominent physician and activist Quentin Young to serve as chairman of the once scandal-tainted Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board that regulates billions of dollars in health care-related construction projects.