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The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. approved $36 million in special financial assistance to prevent a struggling multiemployer pension plan from going insolvent, Pensions & Investments reported. The Retirement Plan of the Retirement Fund of Local 305 will receive the funds under the Special Financial Assistance Program, the PBGC announced Aug. 18. The Mineola, N.Y.-based plan covers 918 participants in the service industry and was projected to go insolvent in 2024, according to a PBGC news release. Without the SFA Program, the Local 305 fund would have been required to reduce participants' benefits to the PBGC guarantee levels upon plan insolvency, which is roughly 15% below the benefits payable under the terms of the plan, PBGC added. The $36 million in aid will enable the plan to continue to pay retirement benefits without reduction for many years into the future. The plan had a funding ratio of 24% with $29 million in projected benefit obligations as of Jan. 1, 2021, according to the plan's most recent Form 5500 filing. As of Dec. 31, 2021, the plan had $6 million in assets, the filing showed. As of Aug. 18, the PBGC has approved more than $52.4 billion in SFA funds to plans that cover more than 757,000 workers, retirees and beneficiaries. Created by the American Rescue Plan Act that Democrats passed in March 2021, the SFA Program is designed to shore up struggling multiemployer pension plans through 2051.

Old Dominion Freight Line stepped up competition for bankrupt trucker Yellow’s sprawling North American real-estate holdings, outbidding a rival operator with a $1.5 billion offer for the properties, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The bid surpasses a $1.3 billion proposal by Estes Express Lines and signals a potentially spirited bankruptcy court-supervised auction for the network of 169 truck terminals that would provide Yellow with more than enough money to roughly cover the loans the company accumulated before its chapter 11 filing this month. Yellow was in business for 99 years before the company collapsed this summer. Its terminals include sought-after sites close to major metropolitan areas that are ideal for trucking and logistics companies looking to store and deliver goods quickly to homes. A lawyer for Yellow said earlier this month in bankruptcy court that the company had received formal expressions of interest in Yellow’s assets from almost 100 parties. Executives at several rival trucking companies have said they would be interested in buying some of Yellow’s locations. ODFL’s bid was disclosed in a court filing, setting up the Thomasville, N.C.-based operator as the stalking horse bidder, meaning its offer is subject to higher or better proposals at a court-supervised auction, for Yellow’s properties.

Musicians authorized a strike against the Philadelphia Orchestra if bargaining breaks down for an agreement to replace the four-year deal that expires on Sept. 10. Local 77 of the American Federation of Musicians said Sunday that 95% of voting members approved the strike authorization a day earlier. In addition to an agreement on compensation and benefits, the union said it wants 15 vacant positions filled, the Associated Press reported. Base salary in 2022-23 was $152,256, including electronic media agreement wages, the union said. Each musician received a supplemental payment of $750 or $1,500 in each year of the contract. The orchestra completed its summer residency at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center on Saturday. Music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin wore a blue T-shirt supporting the union during an open rehearsal at Saratoga on Aug. 11. The 2023-24 season at Philadelphia’s Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Cultural Campus is scheduled to open Sept. 28 with Nézet-Séguin conducting a program that includes cellist Yo-Yo Ma. The orchestra filed for bankruptcy in 2011 and emerged a year later. Musicians struck on Sept. 30, 2016, causing cancellation of that season’s opening night, then announced an agreement two days later.

Logistics service provider Matheson Flight Extenders Inc. will permanently close its Atlanta facility in October and lay off 335 employees, according to a letter sent to the state through the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act, the Atlanta Business Chronicle reported. The decision comes nearly a year after the Sacramento, California-headquartered company filed for voluntary chapter 11 protection. The WARN filing for the Atlanta facility, which is located at 1970 Maple Avenue in West Fulton, did not indicate if Matheson Flight intends to close other locations. The positions affected by the layoffs, which will start Oct. 15, include supervisors, assistant managers, forklift drivers and material handlers, according to the WARN filing. Matheson Flight contracts with the U.S. Postal Service to haul mail. It’s an affiliate of postal logistics contractor Matheson Trucking Inc., which also filed for voluntary chapter 11 protection during the same period.

United Auto Workers members are planning to vote next week to authorize possible strikes at the Detroit Three automakers ahead of a Sept. 14 deadline, the union said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The UAW's warning comes as the union and General Motors, Ford Motor and Stellantis have made little headway with their negotiations, according to UAW President Shawn Fain. "Whether or not there's a strike next month is entirely up to the Big Three automakers," Fain said in a statement. "Our priorities are clear, the companies can afford them, and there's plenty of time for the Big Three to get serious about these negotiations." The UAW said the talks with all three companies have yet to progress beyond non-economic issues. The three automakers have said they want to reach a deal that is fair to the workers but also gives the companies flexibility at a time when the industry is shifting from gasoline-powered vehicles to electric ones. U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday called on the automakers and the UAW to reach "a fair agreement" before the contracts expire. The union represents 150,000 workers at the three companies. The announcement comes as labor unions are taking advantage of low unemployment to push for higher pay and better working conditions during talks for new labor agreements. The UAW has repeatedly pointed out how the three automakers have reported a combined $250 billion in profits from 2013 to 2022 and argued the hourly workers deserve to benefit as well.

Local leaders are trying anything they can to keep San Francisco’s struggling downtown core afloat, including paying retired, unarmed police to keep an eye out for trouble, the Wall Street Journal reported. Homelessness, drug use, and nonviolent crimes like shoplifting and car thefts are commonplace in many parts of the neighborhood. Downtown San Francisco thrived during the 2010s in large part because of the growth of the tech industry. But those employees easily transitioned to remote work during the pandemic and the majority never came back to the office full time. Under pressure to cut costs last year, tech giants like Meta Platforms and Salesforce laid off workers and cut their real estate footprints in the city. Floors of many downtown office towers now sit empty. Those changes have collided with a series of intertwined problems that have been festering in San Francisco for years, including high housing costs, street homelessness, rampant property crime, the fentanyl crisis and a precipitous drop in public transit ridership since the pandemic. Downtown San Francisco now trails nearly every other major urban center in economic health. Its 25.7% office vacancy rate is close to 10 percentage points higher than the U.S. vacancy rate of 16.4%, according to commercial real-estate firm Colliers International. Ridership to downtown on Bay Area Rapid Transit trains is one-third its 2019 level. Retailers like Nordstrom and Banana Republic have announced in the past few months that they are closing their downtown San Francisco stores. The owner of the city’s biggest mall, located downtown, is handing it back to the lender rather than continue to make debt payments. Other parts of San Francisco are recovering faster from the pandemic downturn, with full restaurants and crowded stores. But downtown has long been the economic engine of this city of 808,000, generating three quarters of the local gross domestic product.

Yellow, a trucking company that filed for bankruptcy protection last Sunday, told a judge this week that it would fully repay the $729 million it owed the federal government by selling warehouses, trucks and other assets. But with its industry in a downturn, Yellow could struggle to get top dollar for its assets, the New York Times reported. Failure to pay back taxpayers in full would be an ugly conclusion to a three-year financial saga that began during the pandemic. The Trump administration handed a financial lifeline to Yellow, then called YRC Worldwide, in 2020, when the economy was in free fall and the company, which had been struggling before the coronavirus, was in danger of collapsing. Yellow’s most recent financial statements showed that its liabilities exceeded its assets by nearly $450 million at the end of June. But the company said this week that it expected to repay its debt to the government in full. The loan comes due in September 2024. The uncertainty about whether Yellow’s assets will be worth enough to pay the Treasury Department and private creditors does not surprise lawmakers and legal experts who have long raised questions about the company’s business and the federal loan granted to it.
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In related news, Yellow Corp. will extend negotiations on a bankruptcy loan until next week, seeking to explore at least two alternative loan proposals that would provide $142.5 million in new cash, the company's attorney said in court on Friday, Reuters reported. Yellow filed for bankruptcy on Sunday with a loan offer for that amount from private equity firm Apollo, a senior lender to the company before its bankruptcy. The trucking company said earlier this week it was seeking alternative financing from MFN Partners, an investment firm that owns 41% of Yellow's stock, and Estes Express Lines, a rival in freight trucking. Yellow is continuing to negotiate those offers, and it has received additional loan offers in the past few days, Yellow's attorney Pat Nash told U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Craig Goldblatt at a Friday court hearing in Wilmington, Delaware. Yellow will likely choose one of the loans, which are "much more favorable" than Apollo's initial proposal, by early next week, Nash said.
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Bankrupt trucking company Yellow Corp will not seek court approval to borrow $142.5 million from private equity firm Apollo Global Management at a Wednesday court hearing, instead choosing to delay its request to a future court date, Reuters reported. The company, which filed for bankruptcy on Sunday, had planned to seek approval to borrow the first $60 million of a new $142.5 million loan to facilitate an orderly sale of its vehicle fleet and other assets. But a revised agenda published before the hearing indicates that Yellow will discuss the proposed loan in court without seeking approval for any new funding. The proposed loan, if approved, would put Apollo first in line for repayment ahead of the U.S. Treasury Department, which is owed over $700 million on a pandemic bailout loan approved by former President Donald Trump's administration in 2020.

Wheels Up Experience said on Wednesday there was "substantial doubt" about its ability to continue operations, even as it disclosed short-term funding from Delta Air Lines, sending its shares plunging 42%, Reuters reported. The company, which charters planes by the hour, has taken a slew of restructuring measures this year including job cuts and management changes as private jet traffic, which soared on demand from wealthy travelers during the pandemic, has slowed. North American business flights were down 3.6% compared with July 2022, according to data from Argus International. Delta said in a statement that it was providing a short-term capital infusion in the form of a secured promissory note to Wheels Up, which is pursuing strategic partnerships. It did not disclose the size of the funding. There was a huge growth in private jet travel because people avoided commercial airlines during the pandemic, but as commercial travel has recovered, it has hit private operators, Delta CEO Ed Bastian told Reuters in an interview last month.