First Cali Town declaring Bankruptcy (Vallejo: lease, crime, mortgage)

[EarthMother1951]

Vallejo On Brink Of Bankruptcy

This will start becoming more widespread as time goes by..........America is in trouble!!!

[tablemtn]

That's what happens when you irresponsibly sign long-term pension contracts that balloon in value over time.

[01Snake]

Originally Posted by EarthMother1951

This will start becoming more widespread as time goes by..........America is in trouble!!!

California is in trouble

[NewToCA]

This is an issue solely impacting a California city. The issues related to it have no impact outside of California, the funding a level of support is a local issue, so the thread is moved.

[Donn2390]

Won't happen. There have been several California cities threaten bk over the years. They will cut servces and personnel, maybe float a few bonds, dump the Police for County Sherriff.
I agree the hefty pensions are a killer. Arnie tried to fix it last year, but the Teacher's and Prison guard unions killed his effort.
Things will definately be lean around the country for a couple of years until the sub prime mess is resolved.

[Niners fan]

I am waiting for a state to declare bankruptcy. It will present an interesting scenario because the legislature is authorized to spend money, with the consent of the executive, but in bankruptcy the courts will get involved. The court has no authority to spend money, but I bet that won't stop them.

Any thoughts on that?

[sonarrat]

There seems to be something about Vallejo and defaulting. First Marine World defaulted on their lease, so the whole thing got taken over by Vallejo. Then the mortgage crisis, with Vallejo rather hard hit. And now this..

[Coffee Mate]

Ever since the ship yard closed Vallejo has been in trouble.....
Mare Island Naval Shipyard...or...'MINSY' was the largest employer in the area. Numerous attempts were made to keep the shipyard active for working on civilian ships, new builds, repairs and scrapping old ships since the Susuin Bay Reserve Fleet is right around the corner. But the city and environmentalists consistently shut down these plans...Yet like many cities in California and in the Bay Area in particular they continued pouring money in to rat hole social welfare programs...and electing moronic and completely unqualified individuals to run the town. Police services had to be increased to crack down on the crime which is still a problem in Vallejo.
I lived in Vallejo for almost four years....and it was sad to see yet another neat California town ....go down...
But the Bay Area is famous for this...Consistently making every effort to chase out any and all military bases or government instillations....and now they are reaping the results of all that...They chased out one of the largest employers...try to substitute cute little fruity artsy 'cottage' industries while continuing to tax and spend like before and in many cases WORSE than before...using silly little bureaucratic tricks to make budgets "work"...And any group of people who try to seriously fix the crazy spending problem get plastered as 'not compassionate'.....
No good.... No mas....No dice....

[cobmw]

I've been studying a man named Harry Dent. Since 1992 he has made a number of seemingly unlikely (and positive) predcitions about the economy. They have all come true. He has also been saying that the aging baby boom demographics will be the cause of a long-lived financial crisis starting in 2010. Makes sense. Think about it. Won't the baby boomers cut way back on their spending once retirement comes? Well they will be retiring in huge numbers starting in 2009/2010. That's when the fun begins for places like CA where Democrats have achieved power buying votes with tax money. It will be interesting to see how big-spending CA copes.

[NYSD1995]

There are cities and corporations all over CA and the US that have underfunded pensions, often to the tune of millions or billions of dollars. The boomer retirement wave will either bankrupt the nation or... boomers won't really ever retire. The latter is my guess.