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"The number of vacant homes and rentals has exploded 52 percent in Pima County in the past 10 years, thwarting a housing market recovery and driving even some middle- and upper-income neighborhoods into decline.
Exposure to lead – even a little – in tap water can cause serious health problems in both children and adults. In this report by Ellen Gabler of the Chicago Tribune, she reveals that a recent federal testing of Chicago’s tap water showed that “nearly 45 percent” of homes “had lead levels spike when more water samples were taken directly” after the initial testing that is done. All homes passed that first test. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials conducted another small study of Chicago tap water earlier this year, which also revealed high levels of lead.
Gabler writes, “Those results suggest that the way water is screened for lead nationwide may inaccurately gauge how much of the toxic metal leaches into our water.”
“The city of Chicago hasn’t exceeded that limit in nearly 20 years, and neither have the majority of communities across the nation. But regulators, scientists and public health officials are worried the flawless results are the result of outdated testing methods, government agencies gaming the system or both.”
As the real estate market began to crumble around 2007, the Florida housing market took a big hit. In 2009, nearly 6 percent of the state’s “entire housing stock” was in foreclosure. While the market has improved slightly in the past two years, there are still “almost 40,000 properties in foreclosure. “Almost 30,000 more are in the short sale process … and “another 56,000 are in preforeclosures.”
Ralph De La Cruz of the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting reveals that because of the giant number of foreclosure cases, the state hired former judges and used “expedited procedures” to get through the cases. “The judges ripped through their dockets, sometimes at a 1,000-case-per-day clip,” he writes. The center also determined the three communities that had “the most foreclosures per square mile”: Lehigh Acres, Davenport and Brickell Key.
Rob O’Dell, of the Arizona Daily Star, reports on the shameful acts of three of the largest banks in Arizona.
The tax liens earn banks up to 16 percent interest, and if homeowners don’t repay their debt within three years the banks can foreclose on their homes. Since the bailout in 2008, major banks have bought nearly 6,000 tax liens in Pima County that total at least $15.8 million.”
Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Wells Fargo are among the top three buyers of tax liens in Arizona.
“Detroit Free Press investigative reporter Jennifer Dixon reports Sunday that Fannie Mae is privately telling banks to foreclose on homeowners who are more than a year deliquent even if the borrowers are seeking a federal loan modification. The policy, uncovered in confidential Fannie Mae records, is contrary to Fannie Mae’s public assurances that homeowners will be protected from foreclosure while applying for a federal HAMP loan.
In this report, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reveals that Burmese refugees who have fled their home to avoid persecution, have found themselves placed in terrible living conditions. The Lutheran Social Services of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan placed the refugees in "cockroach-infested Milwaukee apartments." Most of the rooms did not have fire or carbon monoxide detectors and some were contaminated with noxious fumes from leaking sewage. The company admits that it did not do a background check on the apartment building's owner. Further investigation shows that the owner, Daniel Bruckner, had a laundry list of legal troubles, including hundreds of building code violations and "seven felony convictions for importing child pornography."
In "Million-Dollar Wasteland," The Washington Post's Debbie Cenziper reports that the federal government's largest housing construction program for the poor has squandered hundreds of millions of dollars on stalled or abandoned projects and routinely failed to crack down on derelict developers or the local housing agencies that funded them. Nationwide, nearly 700 projects awarded $400 million have been idling for years -- some for a decade or longer. One delayed project involved three real-estate speculators, once convicted in the largest HUD scandal in D.C. history, who sold rotting apartment complexes to a HUD-funded nonprofit using an inflated appraisal written by one of the sellers' associates. The nonprofit went bankrupt before any work was done; the District lost millions.
Yang Wang reports on the disturbing low-income housing neighborhood conditions in Houston, TX that led to a teens death. Just weeks before 19-year-old Jamesha Floyd was pulled from her burning home, her aunt and uncle complained to their landlord about faulty electrical wiring in the four-room house they shared with Floyd on Sayers Street. And even though many of the exploitative property owners have been "issued correction orders" many problems go unattended, such as, "roofs or walls not waterproofed; improperly attached building parts that might fall; holes, cracks, breaks on floors, walls or ceilings; rubbish, tires and other unsanitary items covering the yards and other conditions that violate construction or fire codes."
Reuters correspondent Scot Paltrow reports on Lender Processing Services, a Florida company that handles half of all foreclosures in the United States. A Reuters investigation shows the company’s legal woes are more serious than previously disclosed. "Public records reveal that the company's LPS Default Solutions unit produced documents of dubious authenticity in far larger quantities than it has disclosed, and over a much longer timespan."
After HUD reviewed the local public housing authority in Lee County, Florida, The News-Press took an in-depth look at the finances and operations of this federally funded affordable housing agency. The newspaper documented instances of employees given Section 8 rent subsidy vouchers and public housing rentals ahead of needy families, kickbacks from contractors, and a staff of 16 employees in which eight - 50 percent - had a relative who also worked for the agency.
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