Butler Snow partner Blake C. Sharpton recently spoke to the Georgia Association of School Business Officials at their 2014 fall conference detailing the MCDC Initiative and SEC sanctions that could be levied if organizations choose to not participate and frequently encountered legal issues in connection with various types of contracts that school systems typically enter into.
The Securities Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Municipalities Continuing Disclosure Cooperation Initiative (MCDC) could have a major impact on local school districts that have issued bonds.
The MCDC, which was introduced in March of 2014, is intended to address potentially widespread violations of the federal securities laws by issuers and underwriters of municipal securities in connection with certain representations about continuing disclosures in bond offering documents. The initiative encourages underwriters and issuers to self-report possible violations of the federal securities laws involving materially inaccurate statements made in official statements regarding past compliance with CDUs. In exchange, the SEC agrees to recommend “favorable” settlement terms.
The MCDC is available to issuers who may have made materially inaccurate statements regarding prior compliance with prior CDUs in a final Official Statement.
Sharpton’s presentation related to typical legal issues encountered by public school systems in the context of contracting addressed a wide spectrum of issues including basic authority to contract, contracting policies, long term purchase and lease agreements, and confidentiality and open meetings act considerations.
For more information on the MCDC Initiative, contact Blake Sharpton at (678) 515-5052 or blake.sharpton@butlersnow.com
About Blake Sharpton
Blake C. Sharpton is an attorney in Butler Snow’s Public Finance, Tax Incentives and Credit Markets practice group. He focuses his practice on public finance, commercial lending and debt financing, and mergers and acquisitions. He completed is undergraduate education at the University of Georgia and earned his Juris Doctor from Mercer University. Sharpton has extensive experience in assisting public school systems, cities, counties, water and sewer systems, airports, higher education systems, and health care systems complete projects related to new construction, equipment acquisition, refinancing’s and related original financings.
About Butler Snow
Butler Snow is law firm with more than 290 attorneys representing local, regional, national and international clients from 17 in the United States and the U.K. Ranked as one of America’s Top 100 law firms in the BTI Power Rankings, Butler Snow is recognized as one of the nation’s top law firms for client service. The firm was recently ranked 48th out of 650 firms in the BTI Client Relationship Scorecard for understanding our client’s business, anticipating client’s needs, unprompted communication, legal skills, quality and keeping clients informed. For more information, visit www.butlersnow.com or follow Butler Snow on Twitter @Butler_Snow.
