Measuring Municipal Fiscal Distress

August 29, 2017

Good Morning! In this a.m.’s Blog, we consider the new Local Government Fiscal Distress bi-cameral body in Virginia and its early actions; then we veer north to Atlantic City, where both the Governor and the courts are weighing in on the city’s fiscal future; before scrambling west to Scranton, Pennsylvania—as it seeks to respond to a fiscally adverse judicial ruling, then back west to the very small municipality of East Cleveland, Ohio—as it awaits authority to file for chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy—and municipal elections—then to Detroit’s ongoing efforts to recover revenues as part of its recovery from the nation’s largest municipal bankruptcy, before finally ending up in the Windy City, where the incomparable Lawrence Msall has proposed a Local Government Protection Authority—a quasi-judicial body—to serve as a resource for the Chicago Public School System.  

Visit the project blog: The Municipal Sustainability Project 

Measuring Municipal Fiscal Distress. When Virginia Auditor of Public Accounts Martha S. Mavredes last week testified before the Commonwealth’s new Joint House-Senate Subcommittee on Local Government Fiscal Stress, she named Bristol as one of the state’s four financially distressed localities—a naming which Bristol City Manager Randy Eads confirmed Monday. Bristol is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia with a population just under 18,000: it is the twin city of Bristol, Tennessee, just across the state line: a line which bisects middle of its main street, State Street. According to the auditor, the cities of Petersburg and Bristol scored below 5 on a financial assessment model that uses 16 as the minimum threshold for indicating financial stress, with Bristol scoring lower than Petersburg. One other city and two counties scored below 16. For his part, City Manager Eads said he and the municipality’s CFO “will be working with the APA to determine how the scores were reached,” adding: “The city will also be open to working with the APA to address any issues.” (Bristol scored below the threshold the past three years, dropping to 4.25 in 2016. Petersburg had a score of 4.48 in 2016, when its financial woes became public.) Even though the State of Virginia has no authority to directly involve itself in a municipality’s finances (Virginia does not specifically authorize its municipal entities to file for chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy, certain provisions of the state’s laws [§15.2-4910] do allow for a trust indenture to contain provisions for protecting and enforcing rights and remedies of municipal bondholders—including the appointment of a receiver.), its new system examines the Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports submitted annually and scores them on 10 financial ratios—including four that measure the health of the locality’s general fund used to finance its budget. Manager Eads testified: “At the moment, the city does not have all of the necessary information from the APA to fully address any questions…We have been informed, by the APA, that we will receive more information from them the first week of September.” He added that the city leaders have taken steps to bolster cash flow and reserves, while reducing their reliance on borrowing short-term tax anticipation notes. In addition, the city has recently began implementing a series of budgetary and financial policies prior to the APA scores being released—steps seemingly recognized earlier this summer when Moody’s upgraded the city’s outlook to stable and its municipal bond rating to Baa2 with an underlying A3 enhanced rating, after a downgrade in 2016. Nevertheless, the road back is steep: the city still maintains more than $100 million in long-term general obligation bond debt with about half of it tied to The Falls commercial center in the Exit 5 area, which has yet to attract significant numbers of tenants.

Fiscal Fire? The State of New Jersey’s plan to slash Atlantic City’s fire department by 50 members was blocked by Superior court Judge Julio Mendez, preempting the state’s efforts to reduce the number of firefighters in the city from 198 to 148. The state, which preempted local authority last November, has sought to sharply reduce the city’s expenditures: state officials had last February proposed to move the Fire Department to a less expensive health plan and reduce staffing in the department from 225 firefighters to 125. In his ruling, however, Judge Mendez wrote: “The court holds that the (fire department’s union) have established by clear and convincing evidence that Defendants’ proposal to reduce the size of the Atlantic City Fire Department to 148 firefighters will cause irreparable harm in that it compromises the public safety of Atlantic City’s residents and visitors.” Judge Mendez had previously granted the union’s request to block the state’s actions, ruling last March that any reduction below 180 firefighters “compromises public safety,” and that any reduction should happen “through attrition and retirements.”

Gov. Christie Friday signed into law an alternative fiscal measure for the city, S. 3311, which requires the state to offer an early-retirement incentive program to the city’s police officers, firefighters, and first responders facing layoffs, noting at the bill signing what he deemed the Garden State’s success in its stewardship of the city since November under the Municipal Stabilization and Recovery Act, citing Atlantic City’s “great strides to secure its finances and its future.” The Governor noted a drop of 11.4 percent in the city’s overall property-tax rate, the resolution of casino property-tax appeals, and recent investments in the city. For their parts, Senate President Steve Sweeney and Assemblyman Vince Mazzeo, sponsors of the legislation, said the new law would let the city “reduce the size of its police and fire departments without jeopardizing public safety,” adding that the incentive plan, which became effective with the Governor’s signature, would not affect existing contracts or collective bargaining rights—or, as Sen. Sweeney stated: “We don’t want to see any layoffs occur, but if a reduction in workers is required, early retirement should be offered first to the men and women who have served the city.” For his part, Atlantic City Mayor Don Guardian said, “I’m glad that the Governor and the State continue to follow the plan that we gave them 10 months ago. As all the pieces that we originally proposed continue to come together, Atlantic City will continue to move further in the right direction.”

For its part, the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs, which has been the fiscal overseer of the state takeover of Atlantic City, has touted the fiscal progress achieved this year from state intervention, including the adoption of a $206.3 million budget that is 20 percent lower than the city’s FY2015 budget, due to even $56 million less than 2015 due to savings from staff adjustments and outsourcing certain municipal services. Nevertheless, Atlantic City, has yet to see the dial spin from red to black: the city, with some $224 million in bonded debt, has deep junk-level credit ratings of CC by S&P Global Ratings and Caa3 by Moody’s Investors Service; it confronts looming debt service payments, including $6.1 million owed on Nov. 1, according to S&P.

Scrambling in Scranton. Moody’s is also characteristically moody about the fiscal ills of Scranton, Pennsylvania, especially in the wake of a court decision barring the city from  collecting certain taxes under a state law—a decision Moody’s noted  “may reduce tax revenue, which is a vital funding source for the city’s operations.” Lackawanna County Court of Common Pleas Judge James Gibbons, at the beginning of the month, in a preliminary ruling against the city, in response to a challenge by a group of eight taxpayers, led by Mayoral candidate Gary St. Fleur, had challenged Scranton’s ability to levy and collect certain taxes under Pennsylvania’s Act 511, a state local tax enabling act. His preliminary ruling against the city affects whether the Home Rule Charter law supersedes the statutory cap contained in Act 511. Unsurprisingly, the City of Scranton has filed a motion for reconsideration and requested the court to enable it to appeal to the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania. The city, the state’s sixth-largest city (77,000), and the County seat for Lackawanna County is the geographic and cultural center of the Lackawanna River valley, was incorporated on St. Valentine’s Day 161 years ago—going on to become a major industrial city, a center of mining and railroads, and attracted thousands of new immigrants. It was a city, which acted to earn the moniker of the “Electric City” when electric lights were first introduced in 1880 at Dickson Locomotive Works. Today, the city is striving to exit state oversight under the state’s Act 47—oversight the municipality has been under for a quarter century.

Currently, Moody’s does not provide a credit rating for the city; however, Standard and Poor’s last month upgraded the city’s general obligation bonds to a still-junk BB-plus, citing revenue from a sewer-system sale, whilst Standard and Poor’s cited the city’s improved budget flexibility and liquidity, stemming largely from a sewer-system sale which enabled the municipality to retire more than $40 million of high-coupon debt. Moreover, Scranton suspended its cost-of-living-adjustments, and manifested its intent to apply a portion of sewer system sale proceeds to meet its public pension liabilities. Ergo, Moody’s writes: “These positive steps have been important for paying off high interest debt and funding the city’s distressed pension plans…While these one-off revenue infusions have been positive, Scranton faces an elevated fixed cost burden of over 40% of general fund revenues…Act 511 tax revenues are an important revenue source for achieving ongoing, balanced operations, particularly as double-digit property tax increases have been met with significant discontent from city residents. The potential loss of Act 511 tax revenues comes at a time when revenues for the city are projected to be stagnant through 2020.”

The road to municipal fiscal insolvency is easier, mayhap, because it is downhill: Scranton fiscal challenges commenced five years ago, when its City Council skipped a $1 million municipal bond payment in the wake if a political spat; Scranton has since repaid the debt. Nevertheless, as Moody’s notes: “If the city cannot balance its budget without illegally taxing the Scranton people, it is absolute proof that the budget is not sustainable…Scranton has sold off all its public assets and raised taxes excessively with the result being a declining tax base and unfriendly business environment…The city needs to come to terms with present economic realities by cutting spending and lowering taxes. This is the only option for the city.”

Scranton Mayoral candidate Gary St. Fleur has said the city should file for Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy and has pushed for a related ballot measure. Combined taxes collected under Act 511, including a local services tax that Scranton recently tripled, cannot exceed 1.2% of Scranton’s total market value.  Based on 2015 market values, according to Moody’s, Scranton’s “511 cap” totals $27.3 million. In fiscal 2015 and 2016, the city collected $34.5 million and $36.8 million, respectively, and for 2018, the city has budgeted to receive $38 million.  The city, said Moody’s, relied on those revenues for 37.7% of fiscal 2015 and 35.9% of fiscal 2016 total governmental revenues. “A significant reduction in these tax revenues would leave the city a significant revenue gap if total Act 511 tax revenues were decline by nearly 25%,” Moody’s said.

Heavy Municipal Fiscal Lifting. Being mayor of battered East Cleveland is one of those difficult jobs that many people (and readers) would decline. If you were to motor along Euclid Avenue, the city’s main street, you would witness why: it is riddled with potholes and flanked by abandoned, decayed buildings. Unsurprisingly, in a city still awaiting authorization from the State of Ohio to file for chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy, blight, rising crime, and poor schools, have created the pretext for East Clevelanders to leave: The city boasted 33,000 people in 1990; today it has just 17,843, according to the latest U.S. Census figures. Nevertheless, hope can spring eternal: four candidates, including current Mayor Brandon L. King, are seeking the Democratic nomination in next month’s Mayoral primary (Mayor King replaced former Mayor Gary Norton last year after Norton was recalled by voters.)

Motor City Taxing. Detroit hopes to file some 700 lawsuits by Thursday against landlords and housing investors in a renewed effort to collect unpaid property taxes on abandoned homes that have already been forfeited; indeed, by the end of November, the city hopes to double the filings, going after as many as 1,500 corporations and investors whose abandonment of Detroit homes has been blamed for contributing to the Motor City’s blight epidemic: Motor City Law PLC, working on behalf of the city, has filed more than 60 lawsuits since last week in Wayne County Circuit Court; the remainder are expected to be filed before a Thursday statute of limitations deadline: the suits target banks, land speculators, limited liability corporations, and individuals with three or more rental properties in Detroit: investors who typically purchase homes at bargain prices at a Wayne County auction and then eventually stop paying property tax bills and lose the home in foreclosure: the concern is that unscrupulous landlords have been abusing the auction system. The city expects to file an additional 800 lawsuits over the next quarter—with the recovery effort coming in the wake of last year’s suits by the city against more than 500 banks and LLCs which had an ownership stake in houses that sold at auction for less than what was owed to the city in property taxes. Eli Savit, senior adviser and counsel to Mayor Mike Duggan, noted that those suits netted Detroit more than $5 million in judgments, even as, he reports: “Many cases are still being litigated.” To date, the 69 lawsuits filed since Aug. 18 in circuit court were for tax bills exceeding $25,000 each; unpaid tax bills for less than $25,000 will be filed in district court. (The unpaid taxes date back years as the properties were auctioned off by the Wayne County Treasurer’s Office between 2013 and 2016 or sent to the Detroit Land Bank Authority, which oversees demolitions if homes cannot be rehabilitated or sold.) The suits here indicate that former property owners have no recourse for lowering their unpaid tax debt, because they are now “time barred from filing an appeal” with Detroit’s Board of Review or the Michigan Tax Tribunal; Detroit officials have noted that individual homeowners would not be targeted by the lawsuits for unpaid taxes; rather the suits seek to establish a legal means for going after investors who purchase cheap homes at auction, and then either rent them out and opt not to not pay the taxes, or walk away from the house, because it is damaged beyond repair—behavior which is now something the city is seeking to turn around.

Local Government Fiscal Protection? Just as the Commonwealth of Virginia has created a fiscal or financial assessment model to serve as an early warning system so that the State could act before a chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy occurred, the fiscal wizard of Illinois, the incomparable Chicago Civic Federation’s Laurence Msall has proposed a Local Government Protection Authority—a quasi-judicial body—to serve as a resource for the Chicago Public School System (CPS): it would be responsible to assist the CPS board and administration in finding solutions to stabilize the school district’s finances. The $5.75 billion CPS proposed budget for this school year comes with two significant asterisks: 1) There is an expectation of $269 million from the City of Chicago, and 2) There is an expectation of $300 million from the State of Illinois, especially if the state’s school funding crisis is resolved in the Democrats’ favor.

Nevertheless, in the end, CPS’s fiscal fate will depend upon Windy City Mayor Rahm Emanuel: he, after all, not only names the school board, but also is accountable to voters if the city’s schools falter: he has had six years in office to get CPS on a stable financial course, even as CPS is viewed by many in the city as seeking to file for bankruptcy (for which there is no specific authority under Illinois law). Worse, it appears that just the discussion of a chapter 9 option is contributing to the emigration of parents and students to flee to suburban or private schools.

Thus, Mr. Msall is suggesting once again putting CPS finances under state oversight, as it was in the 1980s and early 1990s, recommending consideration of a Local Government Protection Authority, which would “be a quasi-judicial body…to assist the CPS board and administration in finding solutions to stabilize the district’s finances.” Fiscal options could include spending cuts, tax hikes, employee benefit changes, labor contract negotiations, and debt adjustment. Alternatively, as Mr. Msall writes: “If the stakeholders could not find a solution, the LGPA would be empowered to enforce a binding resolution of outstanding issues.” As we noted, a signal fiscal challenge Mayor Emanuel described was to attack crime in order to bring young families back into the city—and to upgrade its schools—schools where today some 380,000 students appear caught in a school system cracking under a massive and rising debt load.  

Far East of Eden. East Cleveland Mayor Gary Norton Jr. and City Council President Thomas Wheeler have both been narrowly recalled from their positions in a special election, setting the stage for the small Ohio municipality waiting for the state to—in some year—respond to its request to file for chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy to elect a new leader. Interestingly, one challenger for the job who is passionate about the city, is Una H. R. Keenon, 83, who now heads the city school board, and campaigning on a platform of seeking a blue-ribbon panel to examine the city’s finances. Mansell Baker, 33, a former East Cleveland Councilmember, wants to focus on eliminating the city’s debt, while Dana Hawkins Jr., 34, leader of a foundation, vows to get residents to come together and save the city. The key decisions are likely to emerge next month in the September 12 Democratic primary—where the winner will face Devin Branch of the Green Party in November. Early voting has begun.

Lone Star Blues

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eBlog, 2/16/17

Good Morning! In this a.m.’s eBlog, we consider the dwindling timeline confronting the city of Dallas to take action to avert a potential municipal bankruptcy; then we return to the small municipality of Petersburg, Virginia—an insolvent city with what appears to be an increasingly insolvent governing model, enmeshing the small city in litigation it can ill afford. Finally, we return to the trying governing and fiscal challenges in the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico—caught between changing administrations, a federal oversight board, a disparate Medicaid regime than for other states and counties, and trying to adjust to a new Administration and Congress.

Dallas, Humpty-Dumpty, & Chapter 9? In a state where, as one state and local government expert yesterday described it, that state has created a governance structure which allows everyone to avoid accountability, the City of Dallas is confronting a public pension problem that could force the city into municipal bankruptcy [Texas Local Government Code §101.006—seven Texas towns and cities have filed for such protection.]. Should the city lose its current case against its firefighters—a case with some $4 billion at stake—municipal bankruptcy could ensue. Another Texan, noting the challenge of putting “Humpty Dumpty back together again,” said failure of the city to emulate Houston and come to terms with its employees, retirees, and taxpayers would be “cataclysmic.” With about two weeks remaining to file bills in the Longhorn legislature and negotiations over the city’s mismanaged and underfunded police and fire pension at a standstill, state lawmakers note they will likely be forced to step into the crisis, if the city is to avoid chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy—or, as Rep. Jason Villalba (R-Dallas) noted: “I think we’re forced to step in. We’re [17] days away from the deadline, and there is yet to be an agreement between the city and the pension board…I think at this point we have to have a summit or some form of intervention, get everyone to the table and hammer those final issues down. If they don’t do that, it’s going to be a plan that’s drawn by the legislators, and we don’t have a stake interest like the other groups do to understand the nuances.” His statement came in the wake of a stoppage in negotiations over the last couple weeks—negotiations originally set up by the state, and negotiations with a short fuse: the last chance for the Texas Legislature to file bills to address the issue is looming: March 1st.

The severity of the crisis could be partially alleviated by a settlement reached late yesterday by the failing Dallas Police and Fire Pension System in its litigation against its former real estate advisers, whom pension officials had accused of leading the retirement fund astray. CDK Realty Advisors and the Dallas pension system both agreed to drop all claims and counterclaims with prejudice, according to court records filed late yesterday—and came as the city’s pension system and its attorneys have also been battling litigation from four City Council members, Mayor Mike Rawlings, a former contract auditor, and active and retired police and firefighters. The stakes are the city’s fiscal future: its retirement fund is now set to become insolvent within the next decade because of major losses and overvaluations—mostly from real estate—and generous benefits guaranteed by the system. Advising me that the “stigma or consequences for a city with the pride and stature of Dallas to fail would be cataclysmic,” one of the nation’s most insightful state and local pension wizards described the city’s pension challenge as “about as bad as any I have ever seen.”  

Hear Ye—or Hear Ye Not. A hearing for the civil case brought against Petersburg Mayor Samuel Parham and Councilman and former Mayor W. Howard Myers is set for this morning: Both men are defendants in a civil court case brought about by members of registered voters from the fifth and third wards of Petersburg: members of the third and fifth wards signed petitions to have both men removed from their positions. The civil case calls for both Parham and Myers to be removed from office due to “neglect, misuse of office, and incompetence in the performance of their duties.” The purpose of hearing is to determine a trial date, to hear any motions, to determine whether Messieurs Parham and Myers will be tried separately, and if they want to be tried by judge or jury. James E. Cornwell of Sands Anderson Law Firm will be representing Myers and Parham. The City Council voted 5-2 on Tuesday night to have the representation of Mr. Myers and Mayor Parham be paid for by the city. Mayor Parham, Vice Mayor Joe Hart, Councilman Charlie Cuthbert, former Mayor Myers, and Councilman Darrin Hill all voted yes to the proposition, while Councilwoman Treska Wilson-Smith and Councilwoman Annette Smith-Lee voted no. Mayor Parham and Councilmember Hill stated that the Council’s decision to pay for the representation was necessary to “protect the integrity of the Council,” noting: “It may not be a popular decision, but it’s [Myers and Parham] today, and it could be another council tomorrow.” Messieurs Hill and Parham argued that the recall petition could happen to any member of council: “[The petitions] are a total attack on our current leadership…We expect to get the truth told and these accusations against us laid to rest.” The legal confrontation is further muddied by City Attorney Joseph Preston’s inability to represent the current and former Mayors, because he was also named in the recall petition, and could be called as a witness during a trial.

Municipal Governance Bankruptcy? Virginia Commonwealth’s Attorney Cassandra Conover has felt forced to write a complaint, suggesting a conflict of interest in the virtually insolvent municipality of Petersburg, Virginia, in the wake of a city council vote to have the city pay for the legal expenses of Mayor Samuel Parham and Councilman Howard Myers. Ms. Conover, in an advisory opinion, described the vote to approve those expenses as a conflict of interest for the current and former mayors: “It is my advisory opinion that the undeclared conflict of interest disqualified both councilmen from voting on this motion and renders the vote invalid.” (The vote in question, as we have previously noted, was to hire a private attorney to represent Mayor Sam Parham and Councilman Howard Myers after more than 400 neighbors signed a petition to oust two Councilmembers from office.) Ms. Conover cited Virginia Code §2.2-3112, which says an employee of a state or local government entity “shall disqualify himself from participating in the transaction where the transaction involves a property or business or governmental agency in which he has a personal interest,” noting that Code §2.2-3115(F) mandates that in such a situation, there must be oral or written statements that show the transaction involved; the nature of the employee’s personal interest: that he (or she) is a member of a business, profession, occupation or group of members which are affected by the transaction: and that he is able to participate fairly, objectively and in the public interest. In this case, Ms. Conover stated that there was “no evidence that all four of these requirements were met in this case: concluding that the undeclared conflict of interest disqualified both men from voting and renders the vote invalid. 

The governance issue was not just the concept of an insolvent city’s Council voting to use public municipal funds to hire the private attorney, but also that neither Mayor Parham, nor Councilmember Myers recused himself from voting. Nevertheless, Petersburg City Attorney Joseph Preston responded that there was no conflict of interest and that the pair of elected officials had acted legally. Mayor Parham said the city likely will pay the bill for the personal attorney he and Councilmember Myers retained, albeit noting: “We’ve had to make cuts to schools and public safety, and we’re just starting to get back on our feet. It is a shame that we have to pump funds into something like this.” City Attorney Preston noted that Ms. Conover’s advisory opinion “adequately represents what occurred at their council meeting,” but he said he believes the pair of elected officials were legally allowed to take part in the vote, citing Virginia Code §2.2-3112 which provides that persons who have a conflict of interest can submit a disclosure statement on the issue—filings which the two elected officials filed with the Clerk of Court’s office the day after the vote. In addition, City Attorney Preston cited a decision from the Virginia Attorney General’s Office from 2009 which had ruled in favor of the Gloucester County Board of Supervisors, who were seeking compensation for their legal expenses; Ms. Conover, however, responded that the Attorney General’s 2009 decision did not apply to this case, because the charges against the Gloucester Board of Supervisors had been dismissed, and the court ordered the locality to pay for the majority of the legal fees which the board members had accrued, adding that the insolvent city had offered no estimate with regard to how much their legal fees could be. Notwithstanding the Commonwealth Attorney’s opinion, it appears unlikely that the Council will vote on the issue again: Mayor Parham yesterday noted: “I don’t feel like there was any conflict, and we did as we were advised by our attorney…We’ve had to make cuts to schools and public safety, and we’re just starting to get back on our feet. It is a shame that we have to pump funds into something like this.”  

Federalism, Governance, & Hegemony. With the enactment of the PROMESA legislation, Congress created governance and fiscal oversight responsibilities in the hands of seven non-elected officials to make critical fiscal reforms and restructuring of Puerto Rico—either through federal courts or via voluntary negotiations—for a debt that adds up to about $69 billion, but the new law also tasked a Congressional Task Force with analyzing initiatives which could help the island’s economy to grow; however, this bipartisan and bicameral committee ceased to exist upon submitting its report; ergo, unsurprisingly, both Governor Ricardo Rosselló and Jenniffer González, the new Resident Commissioner for Puerto Rico, have demanded that the PROMESA board members support their claims. But now a key area of concern has arisen: if the U.S. territory is unable to comply with the implementation of an information system which methodically integrates the management of important data for Medicaid claims—as mandated for federal eligibility as part of an integrated system to process claims and recover information, which is a Medicaid program requirement for federal fund eligibility which Puerto Rico should have long ago met, the island faces a more stark January 1 deadline by which it must comply with 60% of this system or be confronted with a fine of $147 million—a threat so dire that, according to the Health Secretary, Dr. Rafael Rodríguez Mercado, failing to comply with this requirement would mean the end of the Puerto Rico Government Health Plan. Puerto Rico is the only jurisdiction lacking such a platform, a platform intended to protect against medical fraud and establish eligibility, compliance, and service quality controls.

It was revealed in December, during the new government’s transition hearings for the Department of Health that the development of this platform began in 2011, but that it was not until 2014 that the project was resumed in its planning stage. The necessary funds to begin the implementation phase were finally matched during this fiscal year. The last administration predicted that the basic modules would begin working in a year and a half, and that the entire system would be operating in five years: it was expected that the window for the disbursement of Medicare and Medicaid funds would open in a year and a half. However, under threat of a fine, the government now expects to reach this goal before the date predicted by the last administration. Dr. Rodríguez Mercado stressed that there are currently 470,000 Puerto Ricans without health care insurance, many of whom cannot afford private insurance or are ineligible for the Government Health Plan, thus, many of these people seek out services in Centro Médico, an institution with a multi-million dollar deficit, when they become sick or are injured. Dr. Mercado further noted the disproportionate percentage of Medicare and Medicaid fraud cases, further undermining the territory’s credibility with the federal government—and, adding that local governments have complied  with the implementation of a Medicaid Fraud Control Unit (MFCU), which he says falls under the purview of the Department of Justice. Nevertheless, despite differing points of emphasis, both the leadership of the PROMESA Oversight Board and Resident Commissioner Jenifer González yesterday restated the importance of preventing Puerto Rico’s healthcare system from falling into a fiscal abyss, given the depletion of the $1.2 billion in Medicaid funds which has been provided on an annual basis under the Affordable Care Act.

Yesterday, in the wake of separate meetings with Commissioner González, with one of Speaker Paul Ryan’s advisors, and with Congresswoman Elise Stefanik (R-NY), PROMESA Oversight Board Chair José Carrión claimed that “we always try to include healthcare and economic development issues” in the meetings held in Congress, describing meetings in which he had been joined by Board member Carlos García and interim executive director, Ramón Ruiz Comas, as sessions to provide updates, while trying to deal with the issue which most concerns the Board: health care—emphasizing that especially in the wake of the end of the Congressional Task Force on Economic Growth in Puerto Rico.  

Fiscal Challenges Amid Governance Transitions

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eBlog, 12/06/16

Good Morning! In this a.m.’s eBlog, we consider the ongoing health and fiscal challenges of Flint, Michigan as we await the outcome of today’s mayoral recall election in the insolvent municipality of East Cleveland, after which we attempt to update readers on the porous state of Atlantic City’s municipal utility. Then we seek to escape winter by heading south to Puerto Rico—where the combination of changing administrations in both the U.S. and Puerto Rico leave unclear what the fiscal path forward will be if the U.S. territory is to avoid not just fiscal, but also health care insolvency.

Out like Flint. University of Michigan researchers have more than tripled their estimate of the number of water service lines in the small city of Flint which will need to be replaced, nearly quadrupling the number of lead or galvanized steel lines the city has from 8,000 to 29,100—or more than half service lines leading to 55,000 homes and businesses in Flint, according Mayor Karen Weaver, who notes the updated report makes it important that the city move beyond the use of filters and instead move toward wholesale replacement of water lines: “These findings make it even more imperative that the state and federal government step up to pay for replacing lead-tainted service lines.” The figures are daunting: of the municipality’s 29,100 parcels, 17,500 would need full replacement of service lines, while 11,600 would require partial replacement, according to the researchers. The estimate was mandated by EPA to comply with the requirements of the federal Lead and Copper Rule: because the lead in the city’s water supply exceeded the federal action level of 15 parts per billion, the city is mandated to replace more than 2,000 service lines by next June—a physical and fiscal challenge given that Flint’s records describing the location of lead service lines in Flint have proven to be unreliable, and records for some parcels appear to not even exist, according to city officials—meaning that visual inspections, more time-consuming and expensive route—has served as the city’s only means to obtain an accurate assessment of where lead and galvanized steel service lines were installed. Thus, under Mayor Weaver’s initiative, municipal crews continue to replace service lines in neighborhoods most likely to have lead service lines, and where a significant number of young children or seniors live: the Mayor’s goal is to have service lines replaced at 1,000 homes by the end of this month, although the actual number may be fewer if bad weather occurs—weather with this morning’s chilled rain at temperatures just above freezing augurs ill. To help, the state of Michigan has set aside $25 million to pay for pipe replacements through September of next year—estimated to be sufficient to pay for replacing pipes to about 5,000 homes. In addition, Congress is considering an aid package that would bring tens of millions of dollars to Flint which could be used to repair the city’s damaged water system. If the 29,100 figure proves accurate, replacing the other 28,100 service lines could cost at least $140 million. A key element on this health and fiscal challenge could be yesterday’s agreement between U.S. House and Senate leaders on a bipartisan bill to authorize $170 million for Flint and other cities beleaguered by lead in drinking water, and to provide relief to drought-stricken California. A vote on the water-projects bill could take place this week as Congress wraps up its legislative work for the year.

The Utility & Atlantic City. Atlantic City’s utility water authority board members last week raised rates in an effort to cover an unexpected budget hole—but then topped it off by paying themselves a $3,000 per board member, even as the Municipal Utilities Authority (MUA) board approved the 10 percent rate hike for next year, a 20 percent increase over what had been set at last week’s special meeting to cover lost revenue from a contract change with New Jersey American Water. Under the new plan, residential rates would increase to $50 per quarter from $45 last year; nevertheless, the utility’s rates would still rank near the bottom for the region, according to Atlantic County Utilities Authority data. The MUA’s $14.7 million 2017 budget, down just under 10 percent from last year, is scheduled to be adopted on December 21st, according to an authority news release. The increase would appear unlikely to garner much favor in the insolvent city—especially in the wake of the board’s decision to award themselves $3,000 gifts this December “for their dedicated service,” according to a resolution, notwithstanding that the money was supposed to be a parting gift, not a Christmas gift, according to one board member. Board Vice Chairman Gary Hill yesterday claimed the “December 2016” was an error in the resolution’s language. It appears it has been a tradition that MUA Board members are to receive a cash bonus or gift once they leave the board: the authority’s seven board members make $6,000 salaries and can receive benefits, according to public records. Now, however, the Board’s challenge could be complicated by a different kind of fiscal disruption: American Water, a private company which had been considered a potential buyer of the MUA, which had a $1.7 million contract with the MUA, and was the MUA’s top customer, has recently notified the MUA it no longer needs it to provide water; it turns out that capital improvements to its Atlantic County system have increased its water capacity and “in essence eliminated NJAW’s need to purchase water from the ACMUA,” according to the company letter to the authority; instead, American Water wanted to buy 500,000 gallons of water per day, down from the 1.2 million gallons per day it has recently purchased; however, the lower volume would convert the company from a “bulk purchaser” to a “commercial customer,” meaning it would have to pay a $7 million connection charge, according to the letter, so that, according to the company’s statement: “We cannot justify the additional costs the ACMUA’s proposal would have on the company and its customers, since these significant capital investments eliminate the need for New Jersey American Water to purchase additional water.” Ergo, the contract change and its effect on the MUA budget led to the special board meeting where rates were raised—and bonuses were raised; now MUA and American Water are discussing a potential agreement under which the company would only buy water from the MUA in emergency situations, according to Chairman Hill: the MUA could get just $200,000 under such an arrangement. The fiscal and physical situation is, of course, further complicated from a governance perspective as the city’s public water utility has been at the center of debate between Atlantic City and the State of New Jersey—which has just taken over the city. American Water lobbyist Philip Norcross attended a 2015 meeting with city and state officials in which the MUA was discussed. Mr. Norcross’ brother is South Jersey powerbroker George Norcross. Authority officials questioned the timing of the contract change, hinting it was a strategic move by American Water to get the valuable water works, according to the meeting transcript. “They’re putting pressure on,” said Deputy Executive Director Garth Moyle.

Administration Transitions & Puerto Rico. The new PROMESA law to create a quasi-chapter 9 mechanism for the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico will face signal challenges as the governance of both the U.S. and Puerto Rico are in transition to new administrations. Unsurprisingly, President-elect Trump devoted little time to addressing what his position would be with regard to the implementation and administration of the new law. Thus, while Congress and the Treasury Department have put together both a framework and a Board to assist in Puerto Rico’s recovery; whether and how those might be modified or addressed now will depend upon both the incoming administration in Washington and new Governor in Puerto Rico—where the new head of the Senate’s Health Commission, Ángel Chayanne Martínez Santiago, yesterday urgently requested a meeting with House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) to discuss a possible health emergency declaration because of apprehension that all federal health care funds could expire on the island by this summer, writing that the federal health care assistance affects some 1.6 million U.S. citizens: “We need to declare a health emergency in Puerto Rico immediately. We have no doubt that this is a matter of vital importance—nor can there be any question but that this is a matter of vital importance for Congress and the White House.” The letter warns that, without a doubt, the greatest portion of the territory’s existing Affordable Health Care funds will have been spent before the end of this month, noting: “We are urgently requesting this meeting with Speaker Ryan to set out a strategy to avoid having Puerto Ricans losing all access to health care.”

The situation is further complicated as Puerto Rico is going through its own governance transition. Thus, the U.S. territory’s Governor-elect, Ricardo Rosselló, now must determine not only how to coordinate with the PROMESA board, but also how to address Puerto Rico’s budget, debt, and grave health care situation—and how to seek to work with the new Trump administration after reviewing both the numbers in the Commonwealth’s current 10-year fiscal plan submitted last October by outgoing Gov. García Padilla. A critical issue will be Medicaid—an issue on which the outgoing administration had warned Congress “ultimately will have to address Puerto Rico’s inequitable treatment under Medicaid and its need for economic growth incentives.” The pending proposal by the outgoing Administration of President Obama opined that Congress create Medicaid parity between Puerto Rico and the states, and extend certain tax credits to the Commonwealth: this has now become a more urgent issue as Medicaid funding for Puerto Rico is due to expire near the end of 2017, creating what is called a “Medicaid cliff.” And even that challenge can be expected to be further muddied by potential consideration by the incoming Trump Administration to convert Medicaid’s entitlement status to a block grant program to the states. The risk for Puerto Rico in all this would be if it were to fall between the cracks: should that happen, Puerto Rico’s government, where annual health care expenditures are near $2.4 billion annually, the U.S. territory would either have to raise revenues and find ways to cut expenses while providing consistent levels of care or drastically pare healthcare benefits—benefits already significantly lower than to Americans living in the other 50 states, because Puerto Rico’s Medicaid funding is capped, rather than entitled—meaning that, despite disproportionate health care needs, it receives disproportionately less than any of the 50 states.  

Awkward Transition & Fiscal Death Spiral? Puerto Rico Governor-Elect Ricardo Rosselló this weekend declined outgoing Gov. Alejandro García Padilla’s offer to work on a fiscal plan for the federal PROMESA oversight board. Under the PROMESA law, the U.S. territory’s governor is mandated to submit a five-year plan which itemizes steps to bring about fiscal responsibility, regain access to capital markets, fund essential public services, fund provisions, and achieve a sustainable debt burden. Last October, Gov. Padilla indeed presented a 10 year plan to PROMESA’s Oversight Board which noted that Puerto Rico simply could not afford paying down its debt without federal aid, noting that the government would be still $6 billion short for operating expenses over the next decade absent federal help and without paying any debt service. Last month, the PROMESA Oversight Board members indicated they believed substantial cuts to Puerto Rico government spending beyond those included in the outgoing Governor’s plan were necessary—adding that the Board expected a revised version of the plan from Governor Padilla by next week—a demand with which Governor Padilla said he would not cooperate if it meant revising the plan to include additional austerity, noting the island has had enough austerity, so that further budget cuts would only lead to an “economic death spiral.” Thus, last Friday the Governor Padilla sent a letter to Governor-elect Rosselló to invite him to become part of a joint effort to put together a revised fiscal recovery plan. Gov.-elect Rosselló, however, publicly rejected the outgoing Governor’s offer, responding, at least according to El Vocero’s news website, that Governor Padilla had not released sufficient financial data for the incoming Governor to work with him—leaving the incoming Governor little time or opportunity to offer his own plan—and the PROMESA Board is scheduled to certify (or not) the plan set before it by the end of next month.

Municipal Governance: The Challenges of Severe Fiscal Distress

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eBlog, 11/30/16

Good Morning! In this a.m.’s eBlog, we consider the difficult trials and tribulations of governance in a municipality confronting severe fiscal distress—in this case in the historic municipality of Petersburg, Virginia, before heading West to San Bernardino where the old expression “When it rains, it pours,” might be an apt description as a physical rather than fiscal earthquake appears to be adding to the city’s fiscal challenges as it seeks to emerge early next year from the nation’s longest ever chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy. Then we journey back to Ohio, where a municipal election next week in the virtually insolvent municipality of East Cleveland appears to offer little optimism of any resolution of its insolvency. Then we continue east to Connecticut, a state now confronting serious fiscal pressures. Finally, we head south, not to escape winter, but rather to observe the difficulty of governance created by a federal oversight board and an incoming new Governor.    

Is It a Municipal Government of the People? The ACLU of Virginia released a letter Monday criticizing the Petersburg City Council for meeting practices it said violate “the spirit of open government laws.” The organization claimed the City Council over-relied on special meetings, sometimes called at the last-minute, during the work day, or held in cramped quarters, to vote on matters of governance and financial management even as the city veered into insolvency. In the letter, ACLU executive director Claire Guthrie Gastañaga warned: “Holding meetings at inconvenient times and in small spaces that cannot accommodate the public violates the spirit of open government laws that serve to promote an increased awareness by all persons of government activities and afford every opportunity to citizens to witness the operations of government.” Part of the reaction reflects the growing anger of city residents and taxpayers with regard to the ways in which the Mayor and Council allowed the fiscal crisis to grow unattended—and then to hire at steep prices turnaround specialists from Washington, D.C. Indeed, some believe that the Council’s decision to hire the Robert Bobb Group—especially the way it did so—to try to avert insolvency and potential chapter 9 bankruptcy violated the municipality’s own rules and possibly the city charter, because of the procedure of forcing the matter to a second vote days after an initial vote for the partnership failed to pass, with two council members absent. The Petersburg City Council’s rules require a month delay; the city’s charter provides that a reconsideration vote must have as many members present as were there for the initial vote. The city attorney has defended the vote, asserting that nothing illegal or untoward transpired during the second consideration of the Bobb Group contract, which sealed the $350,000, five-month fee from the nearly bankrupt municipality with the firm. The aftertaste led citizens to publicly lambaste Mayor W. Howard Myers at a council meeting following the vote: now those citizens are actively circulating a recall petition to force the Mayor to step down. As Barb Rudolph, an organizer of the community group Clean Sweep Petersburg, put it: “For the many citizens of Petersburg who want to better understand what our elected leaders are deciding and why, this letter is most welcome…It puts City Council on notice that they can’t hide behind their misinterpretation of FOIA laws and inadequate commitment to open government.”

The vote last month on hiring the Bobb Group took place at one of 13 special meetings called by the City Council between March and October, according to the ACLU’s review. The Council publicized some in advance as being called solely for closed-session discussions, which “has the result of suppressing interest in attending and participating,” according to Ms. Gastañaga, who is pressing for the Council to be more open and resort less to executive sessions, or, as she puts it: “Even if legally permitted, the Council should hold all meetings in public unless there is a specific and important policy reason for the Council to meet outside of the hearing of the residents and public the Council was elected to serve.”

A Physical, not a Fiscal Quake. San Bernardino municipal employees are one step closer to completely moving out of City Hall, not because of the city’s chapter 9 bankruptcy—from which the city expects to emerge next March, but rather in response to a substantial earthquake risk: the City Council voted 7-0 Monday night to authorize City Manager Mark Scott to lease office space in two adjacent buildings in the wake of seismic experts’ warnings that the 43-year-old City Hall building is likely to collapse during a strong earthquake. The plan is to seek a grant to retrofit City Hall so that it could comply with modern earthquake standards and employees can return; however, for the municipality hoping to emerge from the nation’s longest chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy early next year, the physical disruption will be costly: it will take more than $14 million and an extended period of time, according to the city’s engineering study. Moreover, because the city was unable to obtain a lease for less than two years, the city will pay a total of $42,688 and $21,566—per month for the first year of the two-year lease, and a bit more for the second year. Additional costs associated with the move, including Information Technology costs and a moving company, approach $500,000, according to the staff report. Mayhap unsurprisingly, the plan was blasted at a Council session Monday by all of the members of the public who spoke—with one member of the public telling the Mayor and Council: “Anybody that votes yes on (the lease proposal) at this time, with as little studying as has been done, deserves to be removed from their office.”

The city, now addressing its fiscal earthquake, has received two independent engineering evaluations, in 2007 and 2016, which warn that City Hall sits atop two large faults, making it unsafe in an earthquake. The February study concluded that a magnitude 6.0 earthquake would lead to “a likelihood of building failure” for City Hall, which was designed before code updates following the 1971 Sylmar and 1994 Northridge earthquakes. With a greater than 90 percent chance of an earthquake of 6.0 or greater striking the region within 50 years, it would appear that steps not anticipated in the city’s chapter 9 plan of debt adjustment will require spending not included in that plan—spending not well received by the city’s taxpayers, who fear such spending will likely come at the expense of what they already complain is inadequate spending to combat crime, homelessness, and other issues. Moreover, the time contemplated—nine years—has added to citizen frustrations. Or as one citizen testified before the Council referring to the seismic information provided to the city nearly a decade ago: “Nine years?…I’ve heard of slow bureaucracy, but what kind of an emergency is it, if it’s nine years down the road?”

Municipal Integrity. The old expression that “when it rains, it pours,” might be apt for East Cleveland Mayor Gary Norton, who is seemingly waiting for Godot—that is, the State of Ohio to respond to the City’s request for authorization to file for chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy, but, instead, is confronted by an Ohio state board’s large fines for filing incomplete and late campaign finance reports related to next week’s municipal elections—in this case a recall election. Last month, the Ohio Elections Commission fined the Mayor $114,000—nearly sextuple the levy imposed by Ohio’s Attorney General last year. The most recent fines were levied in response to complaints from the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections that Mayor Norton did not file an annual report for 2015, turned in his 2014 report late, and did not resolve issues with his 2013 reports. In a series of letters, the Board of Elections asked Mayor Norton to fix a number of discrepancies in his 2013 reports—including incorrect fundraising totals and missing addresses. The board also requested proof of mileage, bank fees, phone expenses, and other spending for that year. Mayor and candidate Norton also is confronted by complaints over several missing finance reports from years prior to 2013, according to elections commission case summary records. Many of those reports have since been submitted and posted on the county board of elections website: a year ago last August, the elections commission imposed a $20,000 fine in connection with many of those cases. Mayor Norton’s last reported fundraising was in 2013, when he won a second term. He reported raising no money in 2014. Election commission fines balloon quickly. Mayor Norton’s grew by $100 for every day the problems remained unaddressed.

State Fiscal Sustainability? In Connecticut, where the state motto is Qui transtulit sustinet, or he who is transplanted still sustains, fiscal sustainability appears to be uncertain. Indeed, downgrades and related underperformance of the state’s debt are anticipated in the near-term, in no small measure due to weaker than expected revenue performance and rising fixed costs. The state confronts an expected expenditure reduction of more than 12 percent in FY2018, or $1.2 billion in non-fixed costs in FY18—a fiscal gap made more stressful because this year’s state budget relied on nearly $200 million in non-recurring revenues. The state’s Office of Fiscal Accountability recently revised state income and sales and use tax estimates down for FY17 by an aggregate of -$115.4 million; general fund revenues for FY18 are expected to post a decline of approximately $190 million from FY17 and aggregate revenue growth assumptions for FY19 and FY20 have also been downgraded. A significant factor has been fixed costs, especially from public pension obligations and other post-employment or OPEB benefits—in addition to municipal debt service and entitlements—which, together—like a Pac-Man are projected to account for 53% of expenditures in FY18. The state projects that pensions, OPEB, and debt service costs will rise by nearly 15%, while entitlements grow by nearly 5% in FY18. Worse, anticipated higher interest rates will add to future fixed costs in the form of debt service costs, while at the same time reducing bond premiums which the state has used over the past several years to reduce debt service appropriations. If there is any upside, it is that Connecticut has fully funded its pensions since 2012, albeit it has computed the liability using a relatively aggressive discount rate of 8 percent. Should the funds return less than this rate, pension costs will rise more than projected as the higher liability is amortized.

The Promise of PROMESA. Our insightful colleagues at Municipal Market Analytics note that the federally created PROMESA board has demanded that any fiscal reform plan adopted by the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico be:

• honest with regard to any incremental federal aid Congress and the new Trump administration might provide,
• that recurring revenues must actually be set to afford recurring expenses and vice-versa, and
• that traditional capital market access cannot be assumed, but rather must be cultivated through balanced settlements.

MMA noted this to be “an unexpectedly earnest expression by the board and a very positive development for Puerto Rico in the long-term, although it also exacerbates short-term volatility by making standard extend-and-pretend restructuring strategies more difficult to pull off.” In response (or really non-response), outgoing Alejandro Javier García Padilla noted that although his own plan assumes massive injections of new federal aid, leaves current commonwealth spending levels unchanged, and disregards the market access issue entirely; he would not be submitting an amended version—a response that makes more difficult the PROMESA Board’s ambitious December 15^th deadline for submitting its plan. MMA perspicaciously notes that the federal oversight board’s perspective could also pose a threat to the recent price appreciation in Puerto Rico’s municipal bonds, noting that to the extent to which the Commonwealth, nearing next month’s change of administrations, is forced to meaningfully address its massive structural budget deficit, there will be little room to project payment of debt service in the near– or medium-terms, with MMA noting: “In theory, more sustainable projections will reduce the size of any bondholder recovery, but will allow for higher bond ratings once a restructuring has been completed. Adding to medium-term issues, an acceptable plan’s likely need for sweeping layoffs, service austerity, and, potentially, pension payout reductions increases the potential for social unrest on the island: a development that will aid no parties besides partisans for independence.”  

Is There Promise in PROMESA? The Puerto Rico PROMESA Financial Oversight and Management Board has appealed a U.S. District Court ruling that stopped it from intervening in several consolidated suits filed against the government, having filed a motion in October to intervene in four consolidated lawsuits in order to make known its views on the plaintiffs’ pending motions to lift the automatic stay imposed under §405 of the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act (PROMESA). Thus, two weeks ago, U.S. District Court Judge Francisco Besosa denied the oversight board’s request to intervene in the suits filed by U.S. Bank Trust, Brigade Leveraged Capital Structures Fund Ltd, National Public Finance Guarantee Corp. and the Dionisio Trigo group of bondholders—a suit in which the plaintiffs were challenging the constitutionality of the Moratorium Act, which stopped payments to bondholders. Judge Besosa, early this month, had upheld a block on creditors’ ability to file lawsuits against the government of Puerto Rico in an attempt to extract repayment on defaulted municipal bonds to give time to the territory to restructure its $69 billion debt load—with the stay order part of the PROMESA Act: Judge Besosa consolidated the lawsuit filed by Altair with the suits by three other claimants and imposed a stay on them, writing: “The Court hastens to add that the Commonwealth defendants must not abuse or squander the ‘breathing room’ that the Court’s decision fosters. The purpose of the PROMESA stay is to allow the Commonwealth to engage in meaningful, voluntary negotiations with its creditors without the distraction and burden of defending numerous lawsuits.” (Besides Altair, the lawsuit was brought by Peaje Investments LLC and Assured Guaranty Corp against the government and outgoing Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla.)

Unpromising? Puerto Rico Governor-Elect Ricardo Rosselló has opted to select his campaign manager, Elías Sánchez Sifonte, to replace public finance veteran Richard Ravitch as Puerto Rico’s non-voting representative to the PROMESA Oversight Board. Commencing next year, Senor Sánchez Sifonte will replace Mr. Ravitch, and losing the experience and expertise of a public finance veteran of the Detroit oversight board, as well as someone who played a key oversight role in the cases of both New York City and Washington, D.C. Mr. Sánchez Sifonte has held a variety of positions in recent years. Most recently he was campaign manager for Gov.-elect Rosselló’s bid for governorship. Prior to that he was human resources director for the city of Toa Baja, which according to the El Nuevo Día news web site had a payroll from $16 million to $23 million per year in the last 10 years. Senor Sifonte, a Republican, is a licensed attorney and provided legal advice to the Puerto Rico Senate from 2009 to 2011. He has run Veritas Consulting since 2011. According to El Nuevo Día he worked as a lobbyist to the Puerto Rico legislature without properly being registered as a lobbyist.

Michigan’s Role in Municipal Fiscal Fates

February 23, 2016. Share on Twitter

Out Like Flint. Does Flint have a fiscal future? University of Michigan-Flint Professor Marty Kaufman, who has been leading a research team studying the city’s denigrated water lines, has reported there are as many as 8,000 lead service lines—making the announcement yesterday at a news conference at City Hall, in the wake of his team’s painstaking analysis of handwritten records, paper maps, and scanned images to create a digital database of lead pipes. Professor Kaufman stressed that while the project is a full compilation of available data, the records, compiled from a 1984 survey, do not always indicate the types of pipes used—vastly complicating Mayor Karen Weaver’s efforts to get those lines removed as quickly as possible from what, once, was the state’s second largest city, but where, today, the fear of lead contamination, especially for children, can only threaten significant adverse fiscal consequences for the city as families with children become increasingly fearful of remaining in the city—not to mention the apprehension of other families about moving to Flint: fears that cannot bode well for the city’s assessed property values. Because at the time of the switch of its water supply, under then state-appointed emergency manager Darnell Earley, Flint did not treat the water with anti-corrosion chemicals: the omission allowed river water to scrape too much lead from aging pipes and into some residents’ homes. Nevertheless, yesterday, Gov. Snyder said 89 percent of water samples collected from key locations in Flint measured below the “action level” of 15 parts per billion for lead in an initial round of testing, adding that samples from the so-called “sentinel” sites will help determine when it is safe to drink unfiltered water again.

Out Like Snyder? Meanwhile, the Michigan State Board of Canvassers, which is responsible for canvassing and certifying statewide elections, elections for legislative districts that cross county lines and all judicial offices, except Judge of the Probate Court, conducting recounts for state-level offices, canvassing nominating petitions filed with the Secretary of State, canvassing state-level ballot proposal petitions, assigning ballot designations and adopting ballot language for statewide ballot proposals, and approving electronic voting systems for use in the state, has approved another petition seeking to recall Gov. Snyder, citing the governor’s declaration of a state of emergency in Flint after lead leached from the pipes into the city’s water supply. The Board approved the petition yesterday from the Rev. David Bullock of Detroit, who had filed his petition two weeks ago yesterday after the board rejected eight petitions to recall the Governor. Notwithstanding the approval, Rev. Bullock now must obtain at least 789,133 signatures. If approved, the recall effort would become a ballot question which would then need majority support from Michigan’s voters.

Schooling on Municipal Bankruptcy. As every city or county elected leader knows, the quality of a jurisdiction’s public schools are fundamental to such a jurisdiction’s fiscal balance: if the schools are excellent: they attract families to the city or county, with important, positive implications for assessed property values and property tax collections. If, in contrast, they appear to be physically dangerous or threatening, or incompetent; the schools can create the opposite fiscal outcome. Thus, even though many public school systems are nominally distinct from city or county-elected jurisdictions; those locally elected leaders have a very great stake in the perceived excellence of their public schools.

The city and Detroit Public Schools (DPS) have entered a consent agreement setting a timetable to address hundreds of safety and health violations in DPS’ school buildings. The agreement covers the first 26 schools inspected by the city that require repairs; additional schools will be added as inspections progress. Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan stated: “What we wanted was a commitment from DPS with specific time lines for making each repair and a binding agreement enforceable in court if those time lines are not met.” The action by the city comes in the wake of Detroit’s Building, Safety, Engineering & Environmental Department’s four-month inspection program for all 97 DPS buildings after complaints by teachers and parents about problems including water leaks, mold and heating—and rat infestation: at six schools with reported rodent infestations — Blackwell Institute, Clark Preparatory Academy, Cody High, Sampson-Webber Leadership Academy, Ronald Brown Academy and Spain Elementary-Middle — inspections are being done monthly by pest control contractors, according to the city report. Building checks were promptly conducted in 20 DPS buildings believed to be most problematic. Inspections of the remaining district buildings, plus Detroit charter schools, are to be completed by the end of April. The consent agreement, signed by Detroit’s City Attorney and Marios Demetriou, the DPS deputy superintendent of finance and operations, includes a spreadsheet listing progress on scores of projects and completion deadlines. City officials report that city inspectors have visited 64 DPS properties so far. In addition, the Detroit Health Department also conducted follow-up inspections in some cases. It is uncertain how the action taken by the city to deal with the dysfunctional DPS might impact—at least from a fiscal perspective—the suit filed last month by the Detroit Federation of Teachers with regard to building conditions, and seeking the removal of state-appointed Emergency Manager Darnell Earley, although Ivy Bailey, interim president of the DFT, said: “We do not plan to withdraw it until we are confident that the consent agreement’s commitments have been fulfilled.” Mr. Earley, who has previously served, or mayhap mis-served, as Gov. Rick Snyder’s appointed Emergency Manager for the City of Flint, will step down on Monday.

Recovery! Wayne County, the largest county in Michigan—and the home not just to Detroit, but also to 33 other cities and 9 townships—and where Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder last July had declared a financial emergency, and which is still operating under a consent agreement with the state—is now, according to the unmoody Moody’s, stable, with Moody’s Investors Service having revised its credit rating outlook on Wayne’s junk-level rating upward from negative in recognition of the Wayne County’s remarkable success in making substantial cuts to its public pension liabilities and other operating expenses, noting: “Revision of the outlook to stable from negative reflects diminished near-term fiscal challenges.” In response, Wayne County Executive Warren Evans noted: “Moody’s decision to upgrade our credit outlook to stable is a step in the right direction…Our successes last year in eliminating the structural deficit and reducing unfunded health care liabilities were definitely noteworthy, but, we aren’t resting on those successes. My administration continues to work to restore long term fiscal stability to Wayne County.”

The county has succeeded in reducing nearly $50 million in spending, achieved with elimination or modification of retirement benefits, a contraction of payroll, and other operating efficiencies over the last six months—having announced earlier this month that it is expecting $23 million in fiscal 2016 budget relief from cuts to retiree healthcare benefits—cuts which trimmed $850 million from its unfunded liabilities. In addition, the county now projects its annual savings are expected to grow, citing its post-employment benefit liabilities as one of the factors which had driven its deficit enough to raise the specter of municipal bankruptcy. Indeed, County Executive Evans noted: “The restructuring of the county retiree healthcare was the single largest contributor to restoring solvency.” Wayne County reduced its actuarial accrued OPEB liability by 65% in 2015, lowering it to $471 million from $1.32 billion, according to an actuarial analysis from Nyhart Actuary & Employment Benefits: the restructuring is projected to reduce Wayne County’s pay-as-you-go contribution this year down to $17.6 million from $40.4 million. In its upgrading, Moody’s analysts noted: “Enhanced control over expenditures was key to addressing the county’s fiscal concerns given limited options to raise revenue.”

Spinning the Debt Wheel in Atlantic City: “The city’s fiscal crisis is severe and immediate.” A new Atlantic City rescue bill, the “Municipal Stabilization and Recovery Act,” would give the State of New Jersey increased authority over Atlantic City’s finances as part of an effort to avoid the city going into chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy: the proposed legislation would empower the state to renegotiate Atlantic City’s outstanding municipal debt and municipal contracts for up to five years, while also giving the state the ability to leverage city assets and make staff cuts. Under the proposal, Atlantic City would be given one year to find a way to monetize its water authority. The quasi-state takeover of the city, coming in the wake of last month’s veto by then-Presidential candidate Gov. Gov. Chris Christie—a package which would have enabled Atlantic City’s eight remaining casinos to enter into a payment-in-lieu of taxes program for 15 years and aggregately pay $120 million annually during that period instead of a traditional property tax. The introduction of the bill came in the midst of ongoing governance confusion—with the role of the Governor’s appointed emergency manager for the city still in question. There has been, however, little question from the city’s perspective: Mayor Donald Guardian, joined by city council members and other elected officials, harshly criticized the takeover plan yesterday in a press conference, urging instead a new financial assistance bill which would allow the city to maintain “sovereignty,” with Mayor Guardian stating: “We cannot stand here today and accept any bill with the broad, overreaching powers as the one presented to us last week contained.” Or, as Atlantic City Council President Marty Small put it: “We were all troubled by this draft bill: It takes our sovereign right to govern our own city away.”

The legislation was introduced by New Jersey State Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-Gloucester), with Senators Kevin O’Toole (D-Wayne), and Paul Sarlo (D-Wood-Ridge), in an effort to avoid an Atlantic City chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy—with time beginning to run out at the home of the gaming tables: According to a January 21 report from Gov. Christie’s appointed emergency manager Kevin Lavin, Atlantic City could default as early as April absent a state rescue package. That is, there looms an Atlantic City fiscal hurricane—the red flag warnings of which now appear to have disrupted the year-beginning “new partnership” between Mayor Guardian, Gov. Christie, and Sen. Sweeney to avoid municipal bankruptcy—or, as Mayor Guardian described it: “The final piece of legislation that the State presented to us was far from a partnership…It was worse. Some would even say fascist.” Atlantic County Freeholder Ernest Coursey was no less upset, noting: “It will be a cold day in hell before we just stand by idly and just allow folks to run over the people of Atlantic City…I think we ought to work in partnership with the state of New Jersey and stop this hostile talk of a takeover.”

In Rome, they would say: tempus fugit, or time is flying: In this case, time is running out: in addition to addition to municipal bond debt, Atlantic City confronts a debt of $170 million to the Borgata casino from its tax appeals and a missed $62.5 million payment owed last December; moreover, Atlantic County Court Judge Julio Mendez ordered a 45-day mediation period commencing February 5th: Mayor Guardian yesterday said that if no resolution can be reached by then, he will have no choice but to petition the state’s Local Finance Board for a bankruptcy declaration, adding: “The sad irony is that we have a casino industry that wants to redirect their funds to the City of Atlantic City to help avoid all these doomsday scenarios,…There is a reasonable and practical solution out there, but that path has not been chosen by the state yet.”

Saving Puerto Rico. The U.S. House will convene simultaneous hearings on Puerto Rico Thursday as part of an accelerating effort to meet House Speaker Paul Ryan’s (R-Wi.) deadline for final House action by April first: The House Financial Services Committee’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations will hold a hearing on the possible effects of Puerto Rico’s debt crisis on the municipal bond market; the House Natural Resources Committee will convene its hearing to discuss the Treasury Department’s analysis of the situation in Puerto Rico. The subcommittee hearing will feature three witnesses: Anne Krueger, a senior research professor of international economics at John Hopkins University who led a recent economic study of Puerto Rico; Juan Carlos Batlle, senior managing director of CPG Island Servicing, LLC; and William Isaac, senior managing director and global head of financial institutions for FTI Consulting. House Financial Services Subcommittee Chair Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) has, to date, been a key player in seeking to determine an exit from Puerto Rico’s looming insolvency: he introduced legislation last December to give Puerto Rico’s public authorities Chapter 9 bankruptcy protection in return for the creation of a five-person, Presidentially appointed financial stability council, seeking to balance the municipal bankruptcy authority Democrats have been pushing with the oversight authority for which Republicans have pressed. The Treasury proposal the Natural Resources Committee is scheduled to discuss is not dissimilar to Rep. Duffy’s, but it would propose restructuring for the entire commonwealth, a legislative concept deemed by some “Super Chapter 9” bankruptcy—a proposal which has not gained support in Congress over misplaced apprehensions by some that such a proposal could open up the possibility for states, such as Illinois, to try to restructure their constitutionally backed general obligation debts. These members are, apparently, unfamiliar with the dual sovereignty system unique to the United States of America. The Treasury position supports restructuring for the entire commonwealth, but that the extension of restructuring could come through Congress’s power under the Constitution’s Territorial Clause—a clause which gives Congress the power to “dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States.” U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew has backed comprehensive restructuring legislation for the territory, partially to make it easier for its officials to bring all the commonwealth’s creditors to the table.

It Ain’t Over ‘Til It’s Over: One would think that after the long, tortuous, expensive process of gaining approval for a plan of debt restructuring from a U.S. Bankruptcy Court to exit municipal bankruptcy, a municipality could get back to focusing on recovery. But then you might be misjudging. Jefferson County, Alabama, however, finally at least has its new day in court set to determine whether its approved bankruptcy plan of debt adjustment is final: The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has tentatively set the week of May 16 for its expected schedule of oral arguments in an appeal of the county’s successful exit from Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy—albeit the 11th Circuit has no timeframe within which it must rule after arguments are heard. But one could anticipate a long and arduous road: it has taken well over a year to prepare the record for the court to consider hearing arguments, meaning that Jefferson County has now been in appeal longer than it was in municipal bankruptcy case. The lingering issue relates to the county’s approved plan of debt adjustment which .enabled it to issue $1.8 billion in sewer refunding warrants to write down $1.4 billion in related sewer debt two years ago last December—an approval which provoked a group of ratepayers on the sewer system to appeal U.S. (now retired) Bankruptcy Judge Thomas Bennett’s approval, and after, nearly 18 months ago, U.S. District Judge Sharon Blackburn rejected the Jefferson County’s contention that the ratepayers’ bankruptcy appeal was moot, based in part on the fact that the plan was largely consummated when the refunding debt was sold.