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Law enforcement leaders in the central San Joaquin Valley joined California Attorney General Kamala D. Harris in Fresno on Thursday to support a set of homeowner bills she is pushing through the state legislature.
Harris proposed the California Homeowner Bill of Rights at the end of February to protect homeowners from unfair practices by banks and mortgage companies.
Three of the six bills would strengthen the ability of law enforcement to fight, investigate and prosecute crime associated with foreclosed properties.
"There is a connection between keeping families in their homes and what will occur in terms of safety in the community," if homes are left to foreclosure, Harris said.
The public safety portion of the bill of rights would:
- Extend the statute of limitations from one year to four years on crimes related to foreclosure-related fraud.
- Allow the attorney general to create a special grand jury to prosecute crimes that involve victims in multiple counties.
- Give cities more authority to fine owners of blighted property and give new owners of foreclosed homes time to make repairs before enforcement actions are taken.
Fresno Police Chief Jerry Dwyer supports the bills. Abandoned and foreclosed homes in Fresno have been burglarized, set on fire and become home to squatters and marijuana gardens, he said.
The police department has seen a 30% increase in calls since 2010 to assist city code enforcement officers with foreclosed homes that are not supposed to be occupied, Dwyer said.
"We do need to protect our homeowners because when we protect our homeowners ultimately we protect our neighborhoods," Dwyer said.
Bank of America started sending letters to mortgage customers who may be eligible for a principal mortgage reduction under the national mortgage settlement.
The first letters to more than 200,000 mortgage holders nationwide began arriving in homes last week, the bank said in a news release.
Most of the letters should be mailed out by the third quarter of this year, the bank said. They letters provide homeowners with a description of the program and directions on how to begin the review process.
Bank of America estimates that mortgage holders who qualify for a mortgage reduction could receive up to 30% off their monthly mortgage payments.
It is not known if any homeowners in Fresno County have received letters yet.
The $25 billion national mortgage settlement was approved in February.
It would provide as much as $311 million in assistance to Fresno County homeowners whose mortgages are held by the five banks involved -- Ally Financial, Bank of America, Citi, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo.
For more information on the settlement programs, Bank of America Home Loans customers can call (877) 488-7814.
 De Young Properties broke ground last week on its sixth St. Jude Home.
The Fresno builder raises money for the children's research hospital by selling tickets to the public for a chance to win a house.
De Young has raised more than $4.4 million since building its first St. Jude home in 2007.
This year's 2,064-square-foot house is located in the Chestnut Grove community at Teague and Chestnut avenues in northeast Fresno. It has three bedrooms, two bathrooms and a two-car garage.
Tickets go on sale in August. The winner will be announced on Nov. 11. For more information, visit deyoungproperties.com.
The San Joaquin Valley Housing Collaborative will hold an affordable housing summit in Fresno on May 22.
The meeting will give affordable housing experts, stakeholders, real estate professionals and government leaders a chance to discuss the challenges in the affordable housing market and ways to solve them.
The keynote speaker is Claudia Cappio, director of the California Housing Finance Agency. The agency creates affordable housing opportunities for low- and moderate-income families.
The event will be held from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Radisson Hotel and Conference Center, in downtown Fresno.
For more information, visit sjvpartnership.org.
Spring in the Valley brings an abundance of wildflowers, blossoms and swarms of bees.
But don't panic, bee experts say, the swarms are usually fairly docile.
Honey bees swarm this time of year as a way to expand their colonies, said Shannon Mueller, a University of California farm adviser.
As the colonies grow, their hives become congested forcing the bees to divide their colony. The old queen and half of the workers bees leave to find a new home while the remaining bees will raise a new queen.
But it's the swarming mass of flying bees that scares most people.
"It is amazing to see this ball of bees," said Mueller. "But people should not be afraid, swarming bees are usually extremely gentle."
Mueller said that the best thing to do if a swarm lands in your tree or yard, is call a professional bee keeper to remove them. The Fresno County Agriculture Commissioner -- (559) 600-7510 -- also keeps a list of beekeepers.
More than likely, the bee keepers will use the bees to expand their own apiaries that are used to produce honey or pollinate Valley crops.
Almond growers depend on millions of honey bees to pollinate more than 800,000 acres of almonds in California.
Mueller said her office gets about four to five calls a day from people concerned about swarms in their neighborhood.
To learn more about swarms and what to do if a swarm moves into your neighborhood, click here to view a 7-minute narrated powerpoint presentation.
Rooftop gardens are rare on top of office buildings in the Fresno area, but one development company is trying it out.
Lance-Kashian & Co. had a rooftop garden installed on top of the Offices at Palm Crossings, at Palm and Herndon avenues, last week.
The 10-foot by 15-foot planter boxes have assorted flowering plants installed by Gazebo Gardens of Fresno.
"We're experiementing to see what kinds of plants will do best there," said Scott Miller, owner of Gazebo Gardens. "It's standard to use succulents, but we'll be able to spend more time taking care of it so we're using flowering plants and if they don't make it we'll swap them out."
The office building has two floors with the top floor looking down on the lower level. The idea is to put flowers in to cover the air conditioning units and make the area more attractive for workers on the second floor, Miller said.
The garden has a micro spray irrigation system that releases short spurts of water into the garden on hot days. This is the first rooftop garden installed by Gazebo Gardens.
Phil Souza, senior vice president of the office division for Fresno commercial brokerage firm Grubb & Ellis, doesn't know of any other office building in the Fresno area with a rooftop garden. It could be a new trend in the future, Souza said.
"The beauty of this is you utilize space that is kind of unsightly," Souza said.
 Nine families in Madera's Parksdale community received free solar systems from nonprofit solar installer Grid Alternatives.
More than 100 people -- volunteers, corporate sponsors, and solar job trainees -- installed the systems during the nonprofit's annual one-day "solarthon" event on April 21.
(Left: Job trainees get ready to position a panel on the racking system as GRID Alternatives staff explains how to do it. Photo provided by Grid Alternatives.)
The solarthon is a fundraiser and educational event where the nonprofit raises awareness about the fight against global warming while bringing energy-cost savings to low-income families.
The families applied for the solar systems through GRID's solar affordable housing program.
Each solar system, which has about 14 panels, will save a family an estimated $30,186 of energy over the next 25 years, said Laura Gromis, development officer for GRID Alternatives Central Valley.
Last year, 10 families in Fresno's Little Long Cheng subdivision, an affordable housing development at Jensen and Willow avenues, received solar systems.
In case there is any doubt that the agriculture economy is doing well, a new report from the USDA shows that the nation's 100 largest agriculture cooperatives reported near-record revenue of $118 billion in 2010 -- an increase of 4% percent over 2009.
And net income for the 100 top agriculture co-ops was also up more than 10% in 2010, reaching $2.39 billion, up from $2.16 billion in 2009.
"Farmer and rancher-owned cooperatives are a mainstay in the American economy, not only helping members market and process their crops, milk and livestock and creating jobs, but also helping producers keep more of the earnings derived from their products at home, in rural counties and communities," said Dallas Tonsager, USDA Rural Development under secretary.
CHS Inc., a farm supply, grain and foods cooperative based in Saint Paul, MN, topped the list with 2010 revenue of $25.3 billion. Land O' Lakes, a dairy foods and farm supply co-op, also based in Saint Paul, ranked second, with revenue of $11.1 billion; Dairy Farmers of America, based in Kansas City, Mo., was third with $9.8 billion in 2010 revenue.
Valley farmers are member of several of the nation's top 100 cooperatives, including Land O' Lakes; Sunkist Growers in Sherman Oaks, Blue Diamond in Sacramento and Sun-Maid Growers in Kingsburg.
Sun-Maid was ranked 80th with revenue in 2010 of $323 million.
For the complete list of the 100 largest agriculture cooperatives click here
The Community Housing Council of Fresno will hold its annual Champions of Homeownership Awards dinner at 6 p.m. on May 17.
The council will honor the people who have helped provide homeownership to local families and will install its new officers at the event.
The guest speaker will be Sheri Powers, director of The Unity Council, a homeownership center based in Oakland.
Tickets for the dinner at TorNino's Banquet, 5080 N. Blackstone Ave., in Fresno are $50 each or $400 for a table of eight. For more information, call (559) 221-6919 or visit www.chcfresno.org.
Some businesses thrive in unlikely places and Jenny Gidstedt's is one of them. The photographer and retailer just opened her own studio and boutique in a rural, picturesque part of Clovis.
Gidstedt had a nearly 1,000-square-foot studio built next to her home at 12432 E. Shepherd Ave. The girly interior features three rooms for her photography and the clothing, accessories, tea and Swedish chocolate she sells. She'll unveil the building at a grand opening at 3 p.m. Saturday.
Gidstedt, originally from Sweden, moved to the area years ago for her husband's job.
She started doing photography nearly six years ago and founded Memories by Jenny. Though she does family, newborn and maternity photos, the boudoir photography -- sexy but classy pictures -- took off. Now instead of shooing her husband and kids out of the house so she can use an in-home studio, she'll do the photography in the new place.
Gidstedt also started her California Nordic Boutique online last year. Now, she'll sell the feminine tunics and dresses in the boutique too.
And she's begun selling her own line of clothing, Emelie G. The tops and dresses feature little sayings, like "believe in yourself" printed on the back of a blouse.
[photo: Mark Crosse, The Fresno Bee]
Knitting and Fresno aren't the first things that come to mind when people think of tourism. But this weekend, Fresno will host an annual retreat of knitters.
Dubbed "Going to Fresno to Dye," nine knitters, most from Modesto, will spend two nights at La Quinta Inn.
They'll visit three area yarn shops and spend an evening knitting at Anzula, Sabrina Famellos Schmidt's 6,000-square foot downtown yarn company (you can read more about her business and the area's knitting scene here). The next day, Famellos Schmidt will teach them how to dye yarn.
They'll likely be eating at local restaurants and buying from yarn stores.
Knitters are a social group. Sit-and-knit events where they knit and talk abound, so it's not a stretch for a bunch of them to get together for a retreat like this. It's the third such event organized by Molly Carlson, owner of The Urban Sheep boutique in Modesto (the others were in Santa Cruz and a Gold Country foothill town).
And when a knitter is out of town, she'll be checking out yarn and knitting shops. It's one of the reasons The Knit Addiction owner Micheline Golden wanted to be in Old Town Clovis. All those antiquers and people on their way to the mountains include some knitters who stop by her shop too.
They often use the internet to guide their way, with sites like Knitmap.com, which shows knitters where shops are located in cities nationwide. And CraftCruises.com has a section on knitting-themed cruises.
So what do you think, Fresno? Is knitting a niche within tourism that the city could take advantage of?
[photo: John Walker, The Fresno Bee]
It didn't take long for the folks at People for the Ethnical Treatment of Animals to jump in on the recent discovery of mad cow disease in a Tulare County dairy cow.
PETA is taking issue with the treatment of animals on California dairies, saying the conditions are a health hazard to cows and humans. Naturally, the state's dairy industry vehemently disputes that, saying their cows are well-cared for.
Still, PETA is planning to post a billboard near the Hanford plant where the diseased cow's carcass is being held. The billboard depicts a cow half-sunk in manure-laden mud next to the words "Real Milk' Comes From Real Sick Cows. Go Vegan."
"Real milk means real suffering--for cows on factory farms and for the humans who risk real illness by ingesting animal products," says PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk. "The best way to ensure that you and your family won't get sick is to clean meat, dairy products, and eggs out of your kitchen."
Federal agriculture officials have said that consumers should not be alarmed about the safety of their food.
"The beef and dairy in the American food supply is safe and the USDA remains confident in the health of U.S. cattle," said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.
The elimination of redevelopment agencies statewide has many people wondering what that means for future redevelopment.
Real estate economist and consultant, Allan D. Kotin said not to worry, "there are other tools," for developers to use.
While the city of Fresno and the Fresno Oversight Board squabbled over how to handle the dissolution of the Fresno Redevelopment Agency this week, Kotin spoke to students and developers at Fresno State about ways to move on.
Kotin is an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California's Price School of Public Policy. He also owns Allan D. Kotin & Associates, a real estate consulting firm in Los Angeles.
Start by reviewing the profile of all public land, which could lead to leasing opportunities at advantageous rates, said Kotin, who spoke at an event hosted by the Arnold and Dianne Gazarian Real Estate Center and the Maddy Institute.
Kotin also suggests developers work with economic development corporations, which can buy or own property, he said.
Another option is using infrastructure financial districts. The financial district uses property tax increments to finance public projects, but can't use tax allocations that go to schools.
"With RDA's around, this wasn't used much," Kotin said, "but it will get a whole lot more use."
Vietnamese restaurant Wayside Noodles is planning to open a second Fresno location, this one in Fig Garden Village.
The restaurant is planning an August opening and will be in the back of the center near Guarantee Real Estate.
You may be familiar with the Wayside Noodles at Herndon and Milburn avenues. This is the same owner. John Huynh also runs Wayside Noodles downtown Sacramento, Natomas and El Dorado.
He describes the restaurant as serving Vietnamese food, like soup, noodle rolls and spring rolls, but with a more modern setting than your typical mom-and-pop Vietnamese restaurant. You can see the existing Fresno restaurant's menu here.
The number of California houses that received a notice of default, the first step in the foreclosure process, dipped to it's lowest level in nearly five years during the first quarter, according to DataQuick, a real estate research company.
A stabilizing economy and real estate market, as well as policies favoring short sales instead of foreclosures, are behind the slowdown, according to DataQuick's quarterly foreclosure report.
The statewide trend is holding true in Fresno County too. The notices of default filed in the first quarter of this year fell by 20% compared to the same time in 2011.
"Foreclosure activity goes up when property values decline and the worst of that decline was happening three years ago," said John Walsh, DataQuick president. "Right now, property values in many areas appear flat."
The shadow supply of foreclosure has yet to result in a wave of new inventory onto the market, Walsh said. The reset problem, in which mortgage interest rates were expected to increase from their initial low, teaser rates, has also not happened because interest rates have fallen, not increased, he said.
"There's no doubt that housing, especially negative equity, is one of the biggest drags on a struggling economy, but it's not necessarily playing out the way some pundits thought," Walsh said.
With the baseball fields at Granite Park closed, there's not a lot of victories for kids and parents to celebrate at Me-N-Ed's Victory Grill.
So the restaurant owners are trying something new.
Victory Grill has closed and next month will be replaced by Revolución Tequila Bar & Cocina.
"We're focusing on traditional Mexican food made fresh," said John Ferdinandi, president and CEO of Milano Restaurants International, the parent company of Me-N-Ed's.
Corn and flour tortillas are made from scratch and the restaurant will use fresh vegetables, locally sourced when possible. They'll have more than 70 types of tequila and mariachis will occasionally play in the restaurant, he said.
The restaurant is closed while the building is revamped. When it's done, it will feature pictures of Pancho Villa and murals that contribute to a rustic, authentic feel.
"It's eclectic. It brings in different aspects of Hispanic culture," Ferdinandi said.
The restaurant is slated to open in early May with a grand opening on May 5 (Cinco de Mayo).
 Remember the Wells Fargo Home Preservation workshop that came to Fresno in February promising homeowners an on site solution to their mortgage woes?
The idea was to give homeowners, who were struggling to pay their mortgages, a chance to meet face to face with home-preservation specialists, said Julie Campbell, Wells Fargo spokeswoman.
(Left: Homeowners meet with Wells Fargo home-preservation specialists at the Fresno Convention Center in February. Photo by John Walker/The Fresno Bee.)
Nearly half of the homeowners who received a decision were approved for some kind of workout plan -- a loan modification, a payment plan, a second loan or a principal reduction. More than half were denied or canceled by the bank.
Here's how that day shaped up:
- More than 2,418 Wells Fargo and Wachovia mortgage holders in the Fresno area were invited.
- There were 230 appointments total during the day.
- As of April 1, 57% of the homeowners who attended received a final decision. Of those, 43% were approved for some sort of workout plan -- mostly loan modifications. The other 57% were denied or canceled.
- 43% of the homeowners who met with specialists are still waiting a decision.
Seven bills in the California Homeowner Bill of Rights were approved by legislative committees earlier this week.
That's good news for California Attorney General Kamala D. Harris. She introduced the bill of rights at the end of Februrary to protect homeowners from unfair practices by banks and mortgage companies.
But what does it mean for Fresno homeowners?
The bill picks up where the National Mortgage Settlement ends. Only homeowners with mortgages held by the nation's five largest banks -- GMAC, Bank of America, Citi Bank, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo -- qualify for the settlement.
But Harris' plan will make all banks responsible for bad mortgage practices, said John Shore, executive director of the Community Housing Council of Fresno.
"I think that's the most important thing," Shore said. "It's taking that mortgage settlement and putting it into affect statewide with all of the different lenders that do business here."
The Bill of Rights calls for the following:
- Fighting neighborhood blight and increasing fines against owners who don't care for their properties.
- Tenant protections that honor existing leases or gives them 90 days before they can be evicted from a house that is foreclosed on.
- A $25 fee to be paid by mortgage services, or a bank, every time they record a notice of default.
- Creation of a special grand jury to investigate real estate crimes.
The bills still have some hurdles to pass in the legislative process, but Shore says if approved, it could be a great relief for homeowners.
"It's would help homeowners who have been unjustly foreclosed on, people who have tried to get modifications and help tenants," Shore said.
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Remember when I told you about Acapulco Mexican Restaurant Y Cantina closing last fall? The property has a new owner -- and looks a lot different. In fact, it's gone.
Bend, Ore.-based Les Schwab Tire Center has torn down the multi-level building and will build a new store at the location, says Colliers Tingey commercial retail broker Steve Rontell. At right is what it looks like now, looking north on Blackstone Avenue.
The location won't be serving margaritas anymore, but there is free beef involved.
The tire and automotive repair chain is in the midst of a big expansion into the Fresno area.
The company is demolishing an eyesore of a car wash on Clovis Avenue.
Rontell also confirms that company bought property at 4588 W. Shaw Ave., just west of Costco, that was used to store buses and trucks. It will be tearing down and building anew there too, Rontell says.
Les Schwab says it will open another location at 1060 W. El Monte Way, near N. Lillie Avenue, in Dinuba.
A Les Schwab representative said all four locations are scheduled to open this winter.
More than 4,000 high school students, teachers and parents will converge on Fresno this weekend for the 84th California State FFA Leadership Conference.
The event is being held at downtown Fresno's Selland Arena from April 21-24 and is one of the city's largest events.
The convention draws so many students and adults that they take up rooms in 35 Fresno and Clovis hotels. City officials estimate the convention provides an economic impact of more than $500,000 during its four-day run.
"We call this a city wide event because of its impact on the region," said Laura Calderon, sales manager for the Fresno/Clovis Convention & Visitors Bureau. "And they are such a good group of students who attend. It is great to see them with their jackets all over town."
The conference attracts students from more than 300 chapters of the California Association of Future Farmers of America. The organization has seen steady growth over the last several years as more students look to the FFA to develop leadership skills and vocational education training.
Nationwide, membership in FFA reached a record 523,309 last year, the most in the organization's 84-year history. California is second only to Texas in FFA membership with 70,523 students participating.
The statewide conference, being coordinated by Fresno State's Jordan College of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, helps students develop personal and leadership skills, as well as exploring potential agricultural careers.
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