Cash Advance In Alabama

Municipal bankruptcy in Alabama: Will other local governments follow suit?

Beyond the dozens of US municipalities that have already defaulted on bond payments this year, hundreds of others are being crushed by gold-plated union contracts and municipal-bond refinancing deals that blew up in the real estate crash of 2008. It's a situation that some fear could lead to a wave of destabilizing defaults on usually rock-solid muni bonds.

The Jefferson County bankruptcy case, along with three other major municipal bankruptcies filed this year, may offer new avenues for cities and counties to renegotiate their debts. But as it hits the courts, the Alabama case is also likely to be scattered with cautionary tales and caveats that may give municipal fiduciaries pause before ducking into the courthouse to seek protection from creditors.

Either way, "there are going to be other municipalities in financial distress looking at what happens in this case," says Melissa Woodley, a finance professor at Samford University in Birmingham – the seat of Jefferson County.

Indeed, Jefferson County became the fourth municipal entity to declare bankruptcy this year – with Harrisburg, Pa.; Central Falls, R.I.; and Boise County, Idaho, coming before. However, such filings remain rare. Fewer than 500 have taken place since 1937 and only 40 since 1981, according to Bloomberg . The previous record was set in 1994 when Orange County, Calif., asked the courts to reorganize $1.7 billion in debt.

"This [Jefferson County case] was not the first casualty in municipal bankruptcies, and it very likely won’t be anywhere close to the last," writes Jon Ogg for 24/7 Wall St., an online investment newsletter.

Analysts like Meredith Whitney, who predicted the 2008 Wall Street crash, have warned for years about a looming municipal-bond crash – where a spike in local governments defaulting on bond payments could trigger a mass exodus of investors out of the usually safe municipal bond market. That, in turn, could force local governments to either raise taxes or dramatically reduce budgetary outlays and services.

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