State's credit trouble trickles to street level

In the Kenai, they’ll consider a new heating system. Elsewhere, it’s ports, streets or water and sewer projects.

October’s round of municipal elections will ask Alaskans for permission to borrow money for critical infrastructure in local communities. Thanks to the Alaska Legislature’s failure to erase a multibillion-dollar deficit, that infrastructure will cost more. In some cases, it might be a lot more.

The issue is the state’s municipal bond bank, which cities and boroughs use to borrow money. That bank relies on the state’s credit rating, and as the state’s credit has fallen, the cost of borrowing money has gone up.

“Certainly the bond bank program, as the state has been downgraded, has been similarly downgraded,” said Deven Mitchell, the state’s debt manager and executive director of the bond bank.

Read more: http://juneauempire.com/state/news/2017-08-27/state-s-credit-trouble-trickles-street-level