The Detroit News is reporting that for the second time in a year, a state review team has found that the city is in a financial emergency that requires Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder to get involved.
But this time, if Snyder agrees that a financial emergency exists, the governor's choices are more limited. He could appoint an emergency manager to keep Michigan's largest city from plunging into bankruptcy, experts say, or he could continue state financial supervision through a new consent agreement, which seems a faint possibility.
State Treasurer Andy Dillon ruled out a bankruptcy filing at this time.
The six-member review team unanimously concluded in a report released Tuesday that the city failed to restructure its debt-laden bureaucracy under the financial consent agreement signed in April and that Detroit's financial crisis requires Snyder's intervention "because no satisfactory plan exists to resolve a serious financial problem."
"We gave the city every chance to avoid the outcome we're recommending to the governor today," said Dillon, who led the review team.
He was more direct in an interview after the press conference.
"The city doesn't have more time," Dillon said. "They have limited cash right now, limited ability to access capital markets. I kind of think they've got one more bite of the apple to get it right."
Read more at the Detroit News.