The sleeper story of the season: Gov. Bob McDonnell, staff and senior legislators will be paying calls on rating agencies S&P, Fitch and Moody’s to defend Virginia’s AA rating.
According to Chelyen Davis with the Free-Lance Star, McDonnell says he has no reason to believe that the AAA is in jeopardy, but he’s never met with the rating analysts and he wants to make sure they “have confidence in what we’re doing.” In particular, he wants to explain how Virginia intends to honor its commitments to the Virginia Retirement System.
Good luck, governor. Make sure you have an explanation handy for that Senate Finance Committee report that says Virginia cannot borrow any more money if it wants to maintains its self-imposed debt capacity cap of 5% of revenue.