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STORIES:
Greuel
trumpets endorsement by landlord group - (www.latimes.com)
When Wendy Greuel announced a
landlord group's support of her Los Angeles mayoral campaign this week, she
called it a sign of her growing appeal among business and labor. But landlord
endorsements are not entirely a badge of honor in a city where about 60% of the
housing is occupied by tenants. One of the city's biggest landlord groups, the
Apartment Assn. of Greater Los Angeles, threw its support behind both Greuel,
the city controller, and mayoral rival Jan Perry, a City Council member. Perry,
who has relied on landlords for campaign donations, kept quiet about the
group's support. Greuel, however, publicized the endorsement Wednesday with a
press release expressing appreciation, sparking alarm among tenant advocates
who fear she might weaken renter protections. Tenant advocate Larry Gross said
the landlord association and other groups backing Greuel had fought "to
destroy rent control and undermine tenants' rights." "Based on this,
we have a duty to warn renters that Wendy Greuel does not appear to be a friend
of tenants and we urge that they strongly consider this when they cast their
ballot on March 5," said Gross, executive director of the Coalition for
Economic Survival, one of the city's leading tenant groups.
Two
recent bank bailouts and another on the way - (www.ochousingnews.com) Don’t
Blink, or You’ll Miss Another Bailout: MANY people became
rightfully upset about bailouts given to big banks during the mortgage crisis.
But it turns out that they are still going on, if more quietly, through the
back door. The existence of one such secret deal, struck in July between the
Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Bank of America, came to light just last
week in court filings. That the New York Fed would shower favors on a big
financial institution may not surprise. It has long shielded large banks from
assertive regulation and increased capital requirements. Still, last week’s
details of the undisclosed settlement between the New York Fed and Bank of
America are remarkable. Not only do the filings show the New York Fed helping
to thwart another institution’s fraud case against the bank, they also reveal
that the New York Fed agreed to give away
what may be billions of dollars in potential legal claims. Here’s the
skinny: Late last Wednesday, the New York Fed said in a court filing that in
July it had released Bank of America from all legal claims arising from losses
in some mortgage-backed securities the Fed received when the government bailed
out the American International Group in 2008. One surprise in the filing, which
was part of a case brought by A.I.G., was that the New York Fed let Bank of
America off the hook even as A.I.G. was seeking to recover $7 billion in losses
on those very mortgage securities. It gets better.
Tracy
man pleads guilty in $1 million mortgage fraud scheme - (www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com)
Reginald Dodson Sr., 42, of
Tracy, has pleaded guilty to mail fraud in connection with a mortgage fraud
scheme, says U.S. Attorney Benjamin Wagner. According to court documents,
between October and December 2006, Mr. Dodson prepared and submitted loan applications
that had false information to help perpetrate a scheme to get lenders to loan
money on properties sold at inflated prices using, in most cases, 100 percent
financing. The real estate transactions were structured to pour money back to
the schemers in cash-back-to-buyer scheme.
Mr.
Dodson’s conduct resulted in losses of approximately $758,940 to non-federally
insured financial institutions, according to Mr. Wagner.
Debating Future of Fannie and Freddie - (online.wsj.com) Four years after Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were taken over by the
Treasury Department, there has been little serious movement to revamp the
housing-finance giants and the $10 trillion U.S. mortgage market that they
support. But a behind-the-scenes effort to
jump-start the debate over Fannie's and Freddie's future is under way, and the
broad outlines appear to favor winding down the two companies, expanding the
role of the private sector and placing more emphasis on government support for
rental housing. These and other recommendations
will be at the center of a report scheduled for release on Monday
by the Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington think tank. The group's housing
commission is headed by former U.S. Sens. George Mitchell, a Democrat;
Republicans Mel Martinez and Kit Bond; and former Housing and Urban Development
Secretary Henry Cisneros, who served in the Clinton administration.
Giants Dead in the Water - (www.nytimes.com)
It is becoming a familiar
tale: When the cruise ship was towed into port, the endless hours for
passengers of sleeping on deck and going without electricity or toilets were
finally over. “It was really hell,” said Bernice Spreckman, who is 77 and lives
in Yonkers, N.Y. “I used my life jacket, which was flashing with a little light
on it, to find a bathroom it was so dark.” Ms. Spreckman was not among the
4,200 people aboard the Carnival Triumph who this month endured five days of
sewage-soaked carpets and ketchup sandwiches. Her trial at sea came in 2010, on
another ship run by Carnival Cruises, called the Splendor, which carried 4,500
passengers. On both ships, fires broke out below decks, destroying the
electrical systems and leaving them helpless. A preliminary Coast Guard inquiry
into the Splendor found glaring deficiencies in its firefighting operations,
including manuals that called for crew members to “pull” valves that were
designed to turn. But more than two years after the episode, the final report
about what happened on the Splendor has yet to appear, a reflection of what
critics say is a pattern of international regulatory roulette that governs
cruise ship safety.
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