This week was very busy for the County Commission. As I have said before, we do much of our work in committees, and we spent considerable time on several items this week.
In County Services, we started out with about an hour discussing the Land Bank. Treasurer Schertzing presented us with about 130 tax foreclosed properties for the county to acquire. When a property goes into tax foreclosure, the county acquires it and, in our case, decides how that property is disposed of. Some are auctioned off, some are demolished, and some are purchased by the Land Bank to be redeveloped and resold. Some commissioners are concerned that our Land Bank has too many properties as it is and do not want us to take on any further burden. Schertzing explained that many of the properties are bundled and sold at auction, and only some are retained by the Land Bank. And those that are retained are redeveloped and sold to go back on the tax rolls. The Land Bank has been doing an excellent job getting properties back in shape, especially with the current state of the economy leading to so many tax foreclosed properties. This includes both residential and commercial properties. In County Services, the resolution passed 4-2, and in Finance it passed 6-0.
A resolution was put before us that would have the County maintain several City of Lansing parks. The Mayor has apparently requested that the County maintain 25 city parks of 5 acres or less, and 15 parks on the river trail. The language provided by the Mayor’s office, though, was greatly concerning to many of us. We discussed this with our Parks Director. The resolution itself listed several think that the County would do. The primary function would be mowing, with specific conditions listed. These include mowing to a certain height, pick up grass clippings, trimming all vegetation around obstacles (fences, signs, posts, curbs, sidewalks, etc), removal of branches and leaves on trails, snow removal, removal of all litter and trash debris on the lawn, and emptying trash barrels daily. Also listed was signs to be installed by County staff and graffiti removal, but we rejected those two conditions because they would take significantly more manpower and time. It requires that the county do a thorough clean up before the first mowing in the spring, compliance of the Snow Removal Ordinance regarding sidewalks, and other things. In exchange for all this and more, the City will pay the County $236,000. While many Commissioners had some initial doubts, our Parks Director assured us that we could accomplish the needs for this amount. Questions were raised, though, if our actions here would result in layoffs at the city or have other labor implications. We are looking into those questions. We also heard that the Mayor sent this to us without discussing it with Council. Many of us Commissioners are hesitant to get in the middle of another fight between the Mayor and Council (as we did with the zoo), so we wanted to be sure that all parties at the City are aware of this request from the Mayor. We have sent this to our City Attorney for review, and will start negotiations with the appropriate City entities.
In Finance, we had a very active discussion about the Juvenile Justice millage. This is the millage that was approved twice by Ingham County residents. Every year we approve a certain amount of money from the millage to go towards community agencies that assist youths that are at-risk and have not yet gone through the courts (pre-adjudicated). This amount now is $100,000, and Commissioner Nolan expressed that she would like to see more money going towards these prevention efforts when possible. Commissioner Bahar-Cook also discussed the makeup of those that have applied in the past and how they can use the money. The committee had a good discussion of the dollars available, the amount matched by the state through the Child Care fund, and the importance of prevention. We will move forward with the $100,000 amount, but several of us (including me) expressed that we would like to see more for prevention if there are enough agencies applying.
Finally, if you haven’t seen the Lansing State Journal or national news, Register of Deeds Curtis Hertel, Jr filed a personal lawsuit against Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for not paying taxes owed. The County Services and Finance committees passed a resolution to have the County enter into an agreement with the Home Defense League to represent the County and file suit to recapture these fees. In essence, we would replace Hertel as the plaintiff in the lawsuit. Hertel is the statewide leader in this effort (once again) and filed the suit himself because time was of the essence. With passage of this resolution, the County will officially take on the lawsuit, as is appropriate. We expect to receive tens of millions of dollars that are owed to the County by Freddie Mac and Fannie May, who chose not to pay the county and state taxes that are owed. Read here for more information!
And for those following my political State House campaign, I sent out an email this week to supporters indicating that we have raised more than $35,000 in 4 months and have received tremendous support from elected and neighborhood leaders. The momentum has been tremendous, and continues to grow. Stay tuned!
That’s it for this week. That is just a snapshot of everything that we have done, but I think it is long enough!
Showing posts with label curtis hertel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label curtis hertel. Show all posts
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Friday, April 29, 2011
Foreclosures and the Register of Deeds - Special Guest: Curtis Hertel, Jr.
With the crazy news about foreclosures, I thought it would be a good idea this week to invite Ingham County Register of Deeds Curtis Hertel, Jr. to this week's Ingham County Blog. Curtis has been on the forefront of weeding out foreclosure fraud and has been the subject of several media reports lately. Thanks for everything, Curtis. Great job!
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Hello!
On the heels of some fairly big news here in the Ingham County Register of Deeds office recently, Andy asked me to stop by the blog and share some information about what we’ve been up to. My name is Curtis Hertel Jr., and I am the elected Register of Deeds for the county.
I wanted to talk briefly about foreclosure fraud, in which certain steps in the process to foreclose on a home are either skipped or mishandled by the bank that is trying to foreclose.
Foreclosure fraud is something that we’ve always suspected was taking place, in county offices across America. Until recently, we never had any hard information that would allow us to pursue it and actually be able to hold the responsible parties accountable.
That all changed with an excellent piece of investigative journalism on the national news program “60 Minutes”, which aired on April 3rd. The segment gave us some very certain information that we could use to begin searching our records and try to identify those who had been frauded.
The specific fraud, at least in this case, goes something like this: You probably are aware that many mortgages, if not your own, have been transferred between many different banks, throughout the last decade. Every time a mortgage is transferred to a new bank in this way, the bank is supposed to file a document called an “Assignment of Mortgage” in my office. This establishes which bank is the new servicer of that mortgage.
Many of these banks, instead of immediately filing the proper assignments when they take place, will actually wait to file that paperwork until they need to take some other action with the mortgage, such as a foreclosure or a modification. This saves them from paying money into our local economy in the form of filing fees. In Michigan, they are actually legally allowed to do this.
So when it came time for many of these banks to foreclose on a given mortgage, they began the process of filing the assignments… and found that they had lost the original paperwork.
The solution? Many banks contracted with a small company called DocX, whose primary business was to employ low-paid hourly workers to sit at a desk and forge signatures. One day an employee could be Linda Green, a vice-president for Bank A. The next day they could be Korell Harp, the assistant vice-president at Bank B. And then the next day they might find themselves as Linda Green again, except this time they were the assistant secretary at Bank C.
It’s almost laughable that some of this forgery was so obvious, but now that my office has some names to look for, like Linda Green and Korell Harp, we can begin searching our own records and looking for forgery. And we have – so far we’ve found over 80 mortgage assignments that were signed by the names in question.
I am currently working with the FBI, and the Attorney General’s office, to see what sort of larger legal action can be taken against the banks, on behalf of all the register’s offices across the state. I have also filed a criminal complaint with the Ingham County Sheriff’s Office and a complaint in Fulton County, Georgia, where most of these fraudulent documents were notarized.
I truly believe that these names – Linda Green and others – are just the tip of the iceberg. As we continue to investigate fraudulent documents in our records, and compare notes with other offices, it becomes more and more evident that this is not a problem that was isolated to the small DocX sweatshop in Georgia.
So what can you do? Well, if you are going through foreclosure, I would definitely recommend that you give us a call, or stop into the office to examine the records associated with your property. Take note of anyone who signed an assignment or other action on your mortgage, and check the name to see if they are a known or suspected forger. You should also ask your lender to show proof that they actually own your mortgage, in the form of a recorded assignment from my office, before they foreclose.
If you find that there ARE fraudulent documents associated with your foreclosure, or that paperwork is missing, it may not save you from your situation, but it can certainly buy you some time while the banks get their act together. Hopefully a little extra time could be exactly what you need to get through a crisis.
Curtis Hertel Jr.
5176767245
Rd_hertel@ingham.org
Follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/CurtisHertelJr
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hello!
On the heels of some fairly big news here in the Ingham County Register of Deeds office recently, Andy asked me to stop by the blog and share some information about what we’ve been up to. My name is Curtis Hertel Jr., and I am the elected Register of Deeds for the county.
I wanted to talk briefly about foreclosure fraud, in which certain steps in the process to foreclose on a home are either skipped or mishandled by the bank that is trying to foreclose.
Foreclosure fraud is something that we’ve always suspected was taking place, in county offices across America. Until recently, we never had any hard information that would allow us to pursue it and actually be able to hold the responsible parties accountable.
That all changed with an excellent piece of investigative journalism on the national news program “60 Minutes”, which aired on April 3rd. The segment gave us some very certain information that we could use to begin searching our records and try to identify those who had been frauded.
The specific fraud, at least in this case, goes something like this: You probably are aware that many mortgages, if not your own, have been transferred between many different banks, throughout the last decade. Every time a mortgage is transferred to a new bank in this way, the bank is supposed to file a document called an “Assignment of Mortgage” in my office. This establishes which bank is the new servicer of that mortgage.
Many of these banks, instead of immediately filing the proper assignments when they take place, will actually wait to file that paperwork until they need to take some other action with the mortgage, such as a foreclosure or a modification. This saves them from paying money into our local economy in the form of filing fees. In Michigan, they are actually legally allowed to do this.
So when it came time for many of these banks to foreclose on a given mortgage, they began the process of filing the assignments… and found that they had lost the original paperwork.
The solution? Many banks contracted with a small company called DocX, whose primary business was to employ low-paid hourly workers to sit at a desk and forge signatures. One day an employee could be Linda Green, a vice-president for Bank A. The next day they could be Korell Harp, the assistant vice-president at Bank B. And then the next day they might find themselves as Linda Green again, except this time they were the assistant secretary at Bank C.
It’s almost laughable that some of this forgery was so obvious, but now that my office has some names to look for, like Linda Green and Korell Harp, we can begin searching our own records and looking for forgery. And we have – so far we’ve found over 80 mortgage assignments that were signed by the names in question.
I am currently working with the FBI, and the Attorney General’s office, to see what sort of larger legal action can be taken against the banks, on behalf of all the register’s offices across the state. I have also filed a criminal complaint with the Ingham County Sheriff’s Office and a complaint in Fulton County, Georgia, where most of these fraudulent documents were notarized.
I truly believe that these names – Linda Green and others – are just the tip of the iceberg. As we continue to investigate fraudulent documents in our records, and compare notes with other offices, it becomes more and more evident that this is not a problem that was isolated to the small DocX sweatshop in Georgia.
So what can you do? Well, if you are going through foreclosure, I would definitely recommend that you give us a call, or stop into the office to examine the records associated with your property. Take note of anyone who signed an assignment or other action on your mortgage, and check the name to see if they are a known or suspected forger. You should also ask your lender to show proof that they actually own your mortgage, in the form of a recorded assignment from my office, before they foreclose.
If you find that there ARE fraudulent documents associated with your foreclosure, or that paperwork is missing, it may not save you from your situation, but it can certainly buy you some time while the banks get their act together. Hopefully a little extra time could be exactly what you need to get through a crisis.
Curtis Hertel Jr.
5176767245
Rd_hertel@ingham.org
Follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/CurtisHertelJr
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