Safeguard Properties

Blight Bills Active in New York

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Legislation Update
June 4, 2018

New York
A11000

Status: The bill was Introduced and referred to the Judiciary Committee on May 29.

Legislative Summary

Includes zoning, building, and property maintenance code violations for greater than one year as to what constitutes abandonment of property for purposes of the real property actions and proceedings law.

Source: New York State Assembly (A11000 full text/info)

A02419/S07968

Status: The bill was referred to the Judiciary Committee on January 3.

Legislative Summary

Relates to designating blighted property and blighted areas; establishes criteria for designation; provides definition of blighted property and blighted areas; amends definition of substandard or insanitary area by removing the words “slum” and “deteriorated or deteriorating”.

Source: New York State Assembly (A02419/S07968 full text/info)

Appeals Court Addresses Foreclosures & Promissory Notes

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Industry Update
June 20, 2018

Source: DS News

Can the holder of a mortgage foreclose on a defaulting party if they don’t also possess the promissory note? That was the question put before a New Jersey appeals court recently during a case involving Capital One Bank, Freddie Mac, and contested foreclosures. The court’s answer: the foreclosing party must indeed hold both the mortgage and the promissory note … but there’s a bit more to it than that.

The New Jersey Law Journal reports that the case dates back to March 2005, when James Peck IV took out a mortgage with Chevy Chase Bank. That bank sold the note to Freddie Mac but kept the mortgage. Chevy Chase eventually merged with Capital One in 2009, and the next year, Peck defaulted on his mortgage.

In February 2013, after one unsuccessful foreclosure attempt the year prior, Capital One (which was servicing the loan for Freddie Mac) once again began foreclosure proceedings. Peck, an attorney who had represented himself through much of this legal back-and-forth, passed away in July 2016, but his estate continued the appeals process after retaining counsel. In August 2016, the case was appealed, with the Peck estate’s lawyers making the argument that Freddie Mac owned the loan, and was thus “the only entity with the right to enforce the mortgage.”

On Monday, the Superior Court of New Jersey’s Appellate Division ruled that “the plaintiff in a foreclosure action must demonstrate both possession of the note and a valid mortgage assignment prior to filing the complaint,” so as to prevent “the possibility of one entity foreclosing on the home while the other enforces the note.”

“The issue is whether Capital One, both the successor owner and assignee of the mortgage, and the loan servicer, had the right to foreclose,” wrote Judge Ellen Koblitz, one of three judges on the New Jersey Appellate Division panel. She also cited a 2013 Freddie Mac internal bulletin which declared that foreclosures must typically be “processed or litigated in the servicer’s name.”

The New Jersey Law Journal writes, “Since the defendant was provided more than sufficient notice that Capital One was the servicer for Freddie Mac, and since Freddie Mac publicly declared its policy to foreclose through its servicers, and since Capital One did possess the note at an earlier foreclosure proceeding as well as an assignment, the court said the irregularities were not sufficient to reverse the foreclosure judgment.”

In the opinion, Koblitz added, “We do not intend by this decision to approve the way this foreclosure was prosecuted. The note should have been in Capital One’s possession at the time it filed this foreclosure complaint.”

Nicholas Stratton of Stratton Stepp, an attorney representing the Peck estate, criticized the ruling, according to the New Jersey Law Journal, calling it “hard to square with other cases,” adding that “previously, if you own the note, the mortgage follows the note.”

To read the full opinion from the New Jersey Appellate Division panel, click here. To read more about other recent foreclosure-related stories, click here.

When the Waters Recede: Helping Homeowners After Hurricane Harvey

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Industry Update
May 11, 2018

Source: DS News

Editor’s Note: This story was originally featured in the May issue of DS News, out now.

According to the National Hurricane Center, Hurricane Harvey caused $125 billion in damage, a higher toll than any previous U.S. natural disaster other than Hurricane Katrina. Harvey damaged more than 200,000 homes in south Texas, destroyed more than 12,000 homes, and displaced nearly 40,000 people.

The Texas Real Estate Year in Review report from the Texas Association of Realtors found home sales and home prices in Texas soaring to all-time highs for the third year in a row during 2017. Texas home sales increased four percent, and the median sales price increased 6.7 percent year-over-year. But while the market might have taken less of a hit than you might expect given the enormous financial and damage impact of Hurricane Harvey on Houston and the Gulf Coast, that hit is still being felt by many of the homeowners struggling to rebuild.

“The industry is looking at different modification strategies,” said Tim Neer, Director of Loan Servicing, Colonial Savings. “We provide a great deal of forbearance to these consumers, so now they’re 90 days behind and we’re trying to figure out how to get them back on track. For the next quarter, probably quarter and a half, that’s where everybody’s focus is going to be.”

FEMA has allocated $1 billion for Texas coastal communities to put toward hazard mitigation against future storms, such as buying out flood-prone homes or repairing seawalls. But for many homeowners who watched their homes invaded by floodwaters, the recovery is much more personal, much more complicated, and often involves questions they simply don’t know the answers to.

To help answer these questions and guide these homeowners, the National Mortgage Servicing Association has partnered with HOPE NOW, an alliance between counselors, mortgage companies, investors, regulators and other mortgage market participants. According to HOPE NOW, the alliance “was encouraged by the Department of the Treasury and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to bring together diverse stakeholders to address challenges in the mortgage market and create collaborations to solve problems.”

A few weeks before Hurricane Harvey, HOPE NOW held a Housing Roundtable in Houston co-sponsored with the FDIC for nearly 100 local housing professionals. Many concerns were raised over whether the local communities in flood-prone areas were prepared for a major flood. “Unfortunately, the challenges we discussed were very evident when the hurricane hit,” said Eric Selk, Executive Director of HOPE NOW Alliance.

“The industry response from the hurricane was significant,” said Ray Barbone, EVP Bank Operations, BankUnited, and Chairman of the National Mortgage Servicing Association. “Investors, servicers, the agencies, insurers, and regulators all came together with a sense of urgency to develop appropriate solutions and programs to assist homeowners and communities impacted by the devastation of Hurricane Harvey. Notwithstanding the immediacy of the attention and collaboration of the parties, the actual assistance offerings took time to develop and roll out, some longer than others. In the end, I think the lessons learned is that the industry needs a standard set of program and solution offerings on the shelf that can be deployed and utilized upon the strike of a disaster. There will inevitably be others, and there is no reason for us to go back to the drawing board each time one occurs.”

“I think we can all agree that we need a standardized playbook that says, for any disaster that happens, here are the things we’re going to do,” said Neer. “Here are the steps we’re going to take, and here’s the timing of when we’re going to do that. It needs to feel more like a process to our customers and not a knee-jerk reaction while it’s going on.”

In February, the National Mortgage Servicing Association and HOPE NOW began hosting a series of regularly scheduled drop-in center events where hurricane-affected residents can speak to professionals to learn how best to manage their recovery and what resources are available to them. “The events focus on key issues families are facing as they go through the rebuilding process so they can walk away with confidence and feeling support on their next steps,” Selk said.

Participating mortgage servicers will include representatives from Ocwen, Wells Fargo, Mr. Cooper, Carrington, and Wells Fargo. Housing experts will include representatives from Fannie Mae, Texas Department of Insurance, and the FDIC. Attendees will receive insights into rebuilding options, available recovery and assistance programs, and how to spot and avoid scams.

Barbone said, “HOPE NOW was born out of the financial crisis as an alliance of mortgage market participants including servicers, counselors, investors, and regulators. They played a vital role in assisting millions of borrowers with staying in their homes during the crisis. It is only natural that HOPE NOW extends that same assistance to the families and communities impacted by the devastation of Hurricane Harvey. The NMSA is honored to partner with HOPE NOW in support of those efforts to assist families in need.”

“The rebuilding process can be daunting for homeowners,” Selk said. “The worst scenario is a family giving up and abandoning the property. Things get complicated for homeowners when they face multiple challenges including life planning, debt management, and rebuilding. For some families, the process may involve moving, temporary relocation, job loss, or possibly dealing with health questions. We should also consider the needs of special groups of consumers like seniors, who have limited resources and typically live on fixed income.”

What lessons are being taken away from these homeowner events? Selk says there are some patterns to be found. “Two years ago I noticed that about 15-20 percent of our clients were on a fixed income,” said Selk. “These numbers have been tracking consistently. Many families have been modified multiple times. Some participants claim to have been through the loan modification process over three times.”

Selk also spotlights the challenges presented in states with longer foreclosure timelines. “These issues beg larger questions about assistance programs and understanding the human condition. HOPE NOW advocates for streamlined solutions for all mortgage assistance products. It’s a key learning from the crisis. Program applications should be no more than two pages.”

In the end, partnerships such as the one between the NMSA and HOPE NOW will be crucial to helping homeowners affected by natural disasters to recover. However, there is still much more to be done. “The NMSA continues to advocate for standardized definitions and practices with respect to vacant and abandoned properties,” said Barbone. “We strongly believe standardization is in the best interest of all parties associated with housing, particularly homeowners and communities who suffer the effects of blight that result from a lack of such standards. Also, the lack of standards was of particular concern in the wake of Harvey where the risk of servicers being unable to remediate damage to flooded properties abandoned by uninsured homeowners increased significantly.”

“We have to focus more on assisting FHA borrowers with government-insured mortgages,” said Selk. “These borrowers have narrow margins for creative solutions, so we have to commit to good education, consistent messaging, and continuing the importance of streamlined solutions. The FHA families are also predetermined to have fewer resources, so we need to be cognizant of their status and limitations. Last year, we worked on a project focused on simplified language and paperwork. The industry collaborations and partnership have produced some helpful documentation.”

“The most important thing we can do is learn from the last ten years and improve accordingly,” Selk said.

 

Editor’s note: The Five Star Institute is the parent company of the National Mortgage Servicing Association and DS News.

Trump Signs Dodd-Frank Reform Bill

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Legislation Update
May 24, 2018

Source: United States Congress (S.2155 full text)

Additional Resources:

DS News (Dodd-Frank Reform and Tenant Protections in Foreclosure)

HousingWire (President Trump signs Dodd-Frank rollback into law)

Included in this new legislation is the following:

  • Sec. 304. Restoration of the Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act of 2009
  • Sec. 311. GAO report on Puerto Rico foreclosures
  • Sec. 313. Foreclosure relief and extension for servicemembers

The Empty House Next Door

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Industry Update
May 15, 2018

Source: Lincoln Institute of Land Policy/Center for Community Progress (The Empty House Next Door full report)

Additional Resource:

Lincoln Institute of Land Policy (Vacant properties plague struggling U.S. cities, according to new report)

ABOUT THIS REPORT

This report lays the groundwork for exploring the issue of vacancy by defining what is meant by a “vacant” property, what constitutes a “healthy” vacancy rate, how vacant properties are measured, and why properties become vacant and abandoned. It discusses the impact of vacant properties on the communities in which they are situated.

The first part of the report looks at the overall context of vacancy in the United States. The second focuses on hypervacancy: the existence of vacant properties that have become endemic and alter the character of the neighborhood. The next sections describe some of the ways communities across the United States are responding to the problems posed by vacant properties. Finally, the author offers conclusions and recommendations for planners, local governments, city officials, and nonprofits to address these challenges.

Proposed Vacant Building Ordinance Draws Objections

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Legislation Update
May 24, 2018

Source: New Castle News

Local realtors, landlords and developers are concerned about an ordinance under consideration by New Castle City Council.

Among those speaking at council’s workshop session were representatives of Lawrence County Habitat for Humanity who said the ordinance, if adopted, would chase Habitat from city limits.

The ordinance, introduced on April 26, would require owners of vacant builders to post a $10,000 bond or cash for residential property covering costs to maintain or demolish their property. Owners of vacant commercial properties are assessed based on square footage with fees topping out at $65,000 on buildings in excess of 25,000 square feet.

City officials said the bond or cash would be used to correct code violations, abate unsafe conditions, fire suppression and remediation or demolition if the owner walks away

The bond requirement is part of an existing ordinance that requires property owners to register vacant structures within the city. City solicitor Jason Medure said suggested that interested residents call the city law department and a meeting be set up. He added that the ordinance has not yet been adopted.

“There is always room to improve on an ordinance,” he said.

After hearing from only a few of the 10 property owners and realtors speaking against the ordinance, councilman Tom Smith proposed a special council meeting to discuss the matter further. One was scheduled for 6 p.m. June 19.

“I’m concerned that this law will have a chilling affect on Lawrence County Habitat for Humanity and drive us out of the city,” said Habitat volunteer Carl Sacherich. Habitat is a nonprofit housing organization that builds and improves homes in partnership with individuals and families in need of a decent and affordable place to live.

Sacherich said Habitat just completed its 26th house and most are in New Castle.

“A number of your laws are well meaning but doing damage to honest people,” he said. asking, “Please find a solution. This would only hurt honest people.”

Mary Lou Scheidemantle, program director of Lawrence County Habitat for Humanity and a realtor with Howard Hanna Real Estate, said the organization has built new houses and rehabilitated others for 20 years. Program participants, she said, must volunteer hours of sweat equity to qualify, often resulting in houses sitting vacant until the necessary hours are earned on a second house.

“We realize there are many houses in the city in which house squatters live, where drugs are sold and fires happen because these homes are vacant for so long. We believe these ordinances are not aimed at us, but at those mostly-absentee investors who don’t maintain their properties, don’t care about the community and knew from the start that a percentage (of their properties)would be abandoned. We are a nonprofit working with people to lift them out of the very houses that have prompted this extreme solution,” she said.

Other speakers included:

  • Jerry Morgan of North Jefferson Street who said if he is required to tie up funds to secure bonds for his vacant units, he will have limited funds to fix up or maintain other properties.

    “You’re putting a burden on people who are doing things correctly. You’re making us pay for the sins of others,” he said.

  • Joseph Betters, who gave his address as Long Avenue and said he has been buying property in New Castle for 15 years. “It’s hard to find a decent tenant in New Castle,” he said.

    At one time, Betters said, he rented 64 units in Beaver County. “I’ve lost more in six months in New Castle than (I lost) in five years in Beaver County. We can’t get quality people in New Castle. My frustration is so great I sold nine properties in the last 10 days and I’m looking to liquidate more.”

  • Bruce Waldman, president of the Western PA Landlords Association, who said his organization controls 1.200 units in New Castle.

    He noted that “it’s hard to get parts” for houses in New Castle, built between 1900 and 1925, meaning that houses sit vacant while steps and windows are on order.

  • Real Estate agent Joe Carofino called the ordinance a bad idea. “Why would you impose so much on vacant buildings?” he asked. “Has there been a study on the impact this will have on the city? How can the city benefit from this?” He noted house values have dropped by 4.4 percent in the last 12 months.
  • Denise Walters, president of the Lawrence County Board of Realtors, said the organization opposes the ordinance “which will discourage people from buying homes in New Castle.”
  • Attorney Philip Berezniak also asked that the proposed ordinance be amended.”In some estates, the property may be the only asset,” he pointed out.”If it sits empty for more than 45 days,the asset will be eaten up by the ordinance requirements..”

MBA Finds Stevens Successor: Meet the New President and CEO

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Industry Update
June 7, 2018

Source: HousingWire

Robert Broeksmit set to take over in August

The Mortgage Bankers Association today revealed its new president and CEO to take over this summer.

Last October, at the MBA Annual Convention in Denver, MBA President and CEO David Stevens announced his upcoming retirement. He announced he will be stepping down as of September 30, 2018, to allow the MBA time to choose a new leader.

Now, the MBA has done just that.

Sponsor Content

The organization sent out a letter to its members Thursday announcing its Board of Directors approved of Robert Broeksmit as the next president and CEO. Broeksmit will join the MBA beginning August 20, 2018.

The MBA explained Broeksmit’s tenure will overlap with Stevens for a couple weeks as he brings Broeksmit up to speed on internal and external issues facing the association and the industry. Stevens will also begin to introduce the new president to critical contacts, policymakers, consumer advocates and other stakeholders.

He joins the organization from Treliant Risk Advisors, where he currently served as president and chief operating officer.

In looking for Stevens’ replacement, the MBA formed a search committee, chaired by its immediate past chairman, Rodrigo Lopez, and comprised of 12 members from diverse business models. The search committee utilized SpencerStuart, a global executive search and leadership advisory firm.

Broeksmit has spent his 33-year career in mortgage banking, and held a variety of senior leadership positions including president of B.F. Saul Mortgage, executive vice president of Chevy Chase Bank and vice president at Prudential Home Mortgage.

Broeksmit previously served on the MBA board and as chairman of RESBOG. He also served as chairman of the American Bankers Association’s Mortgage Markets Committee.

“In closing, I want to give my everlasting thanks to Dave Stevens for the last seven and a half years,” MBA Chairman David Motley said in a letter to members. “Dave was the right leader at the right time and MBA has never been stronger than it is today.”

“Dave has given his heart and soul to the MBA and on behalf of the entire membership, we are incredibly grateful for his leadership,” Motley concluded.

Cities Now Use Taxes to Fight Blight. Is It Working?

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Industry Update
May 14, 2018

Source: Governing Magazine

Land use experts question whether vacant property taxes are the right way to spur development.

It’s a scenario that plays out over and over in cities across the country: A small business in a hip neighborhood closes, the storefront is left empty for months — maybe years — and then eventually gets replaced by a national chain.

Whether it’s gentrifying Brooklyn, Greenwich Village in Manhattan or Miami Beach, the coffee shops, boutiques and eateries that drew many residents to those areas are struggling to stay.

But why?

The notion of greedy landlords hiking up rents makes an easy scapegoat for policymakers and residents. But the real picture is much more complicated, with an insistence on long-term leases and major disruptions in retail shopping habits all playing a role in the vacancies, according to commercial real estate analysts.

Still, cities are turning to vacant property taxes to nudge property owners of both retail and residential spaces to lease, develop or sell their properties before a short-term vacancy turns into what some cities see as blight.

Cities opting for this solution are seeing varying degrees of success.

“The idea that if you tax the development, you will force the landlord into renting is complicated,” says Joan Youngman, a senior fellow with the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. “In a hot market, the landlord might wait for a high-end renter. If the market is soft, the vacant land tax might force the landowner to allow it to fall into disrepair.”

San Francisco, Oakland, Calif., and most recently New York City have all considered levying vacancy taxes on landowners to force them to develop, lease or sell their empty properties. The moves follow similar taxes levied in Washington, D.C., and one aimed at addressing the residential housing crisis in Vancouver, Canada.

The Washington, D.C., model raises the normal commercial property tax rate from 87 cents for $100 in assessed value to $5 per $100 when the property is vacant. Property considered blighted is taxed at $10 per $100 of assessed value.

In 2016, Washington, D.C., collected $9.4 million in vacancy taxes. Still the effectiveness of the tax remains unclear, according to a 2017 report from Pew Charitable Trusts. When asked, the city could not say how many properties were leased, improved or sold as a result of the tax, according to the Pew report.

It also appears that some owners of vacant property have tried to skirt the law by filing for exemptions, or asking for building permits and then never making improvements. The District’s city council eventually tightened the loophole through a bill that regulates how long a property owner can keep filing for exemptions.

Vancouver’s vacant house tax went into effect in 2017, despite hard data suggesting the vacancy rate for housing in the city had remained steady for more than a decade. Early indications suggest homeowners might not be declaring their homes empty.

Youngman calls the use of special taxes on vacant property “a blunt instrument” in spurring development. Real estate markets are contextual, she says. Washington, D.C., San Francisco and New York have been hot markets.The empty storefronts in those cities are less often the result of landlords looking to jack up rents and more often those property owners seeking long-term leases, Youngman says.

Levying a tax might drive a landlord to fill a vacancy, but the new tenant may not be the type that made neighborhoods like Greenwich Village, the Mission District in San Francisco or Columbia Heights in Washington, D.C., attractive in the first place.

Youngman points to the common complaint leveled by residents who point to national chains displacing local retailers in neighborhoods.

“They’ll say the neighborhood used to be so interesting and now it’s so boring. I am not sure a tax can do anything about that,” she says.

In smaller cities like Hartford, Conn., which has much of its land locked up by tax-exempt landowners, policymakers don’t have nearly as much leverage as their big city counterparts in using vacant property fees to drive down vacancies and spur better use of land.

Hartford flirted with the idea of vacant property tax to spur development. The city has seen a steady migration of employers large and small to surrounding suburbs where property taxes are lower. What has been left are large lots that are filled by the least expensive use of commercial land — parking lots.

“We see a sea of parking lots in a lot of parts of the city,” Councilman Julio Concepcion told the Hartford Courant. “When you’re trying to go from point A to point B and all there is is dimly lit surface parking, the perception of the city is that it’s unsafe. So we’re just trying to fill those gaps in with development — with housing or retail or whatever the market bears, and trying to make Hartford a more walkable, friendly city.”

Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin balked at signing the bill, and the effort fizzled out in 2017.

Ultimately, the decline in local retail may be more a reflection of changing shopping habits than the relationship between retailers and commercial property owners. As more people shop online, commercial real estate markets will remain in flux.

“We are going through such a massive change in retail. The question,” Youngman says, “is are we in a phase of trying to readjust to a new steady state in real estate?”

2018 Hurricane Storm Surge Damage Could Top $1 Trillion

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Industry Update
May 31, 2018

Source: DS News

Additional Resource:

CoreLogic (The 2018 Storm Surge Report full report)

A newly released CoreLogic report estimates that 6.9 million homes could be at risk of hurricane storm surge damage in 2018, with more than $1.6 trillion in potential reconstruction costs at stake.

According to the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), natural disasters caused more than $300 billion in damages during 2017, a year that encompassed several damaging hurricanes, as well as wildfires and mudslides in California. The $309.5 billion total for 2017 set a new record, easily surpassing the previous U.S. annual record cost of $219.2 billion from 2005, which included Hurricanes Dennis, Katrina, Rita, and Wilma. Could 2018 be even more damaging when everything is finally tallied?

The 2018 CoreLogic Storm Surge Report “examines risk from hurricane-driven storm surge for homes along the Atlantic and Gulf coastlines across 19 states, as well as for 86 metro areas.” The report sorts homes into five different risk categories: Low (homes affected only by a Category 5 storm), Moderate (homes affected by Category 4 and 5 storms), High (homes affected by Category 3, 4, and 5 storms), Very High (homes affected by Category 2, 3, 4, and 5 storms) and Extreme (homes affected by Category 1-5 storms).

CoreLogic explains, “Reconstruction Cost Value (RCV) figures represent the cost to completely rebuild a property in case of damage—including labor and materials by geographic location—assuming the worst-case scenario at 100-percent destruction.”

According to the report, the Atlantic Coast has more than 3.9 million homes at risk of hurricane storm surge, with an RCV of more than $1 trillion. This represents an increase of approximately $30 billion over 2017. On the Gulf Coast, more than 3 million homes are at risk, with over $609 billion in potential total destruction damage, a more than $16 billion increase over 2017.

Of the 19 states analyzed, Florida has the most potential for storm surge damage, CoreLogic reports, with more than 2.7 million homes at risk. Louisiana comes in second with more than 817,000 homes at risk, followed by Texas with 543,000 and then New Jersey with 471,000.

Florida also has the highest potential RCV, with CoreLogic estimating a potential $552 billion in recovery costs from storm surge damage. New York ranks second with more than $190 billion RCV, followed by Louisiana with more than $186 billion RCV, New Jersey with more than $146 billion RCV, and Texas with more than $103 billion RCV.

You can read more from CoreLogic’s Storm Surge Report by clicking here.

The Fight Against Zombie Homes Finds a New Ally

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Industry Update
April 6, 2018

Source: DS News

The topic of zombie homes comes up often here on DS News, ranging from fast-track foreclosure legislation to rules about clearboarding and plywood bans. In February, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that the state was buying up distressed mortgages in high foreclosure areas, hoping to help keep homeowners in their homes and avoid the spread of more zombie properties. Now the fight against zombie homes has found an unexpected new ally: law students.

The Erie County Clerk Mickey Kearns and the Western New York Law Center recently announced a new partnership with Columbia Law School to help municipalities within Erie County track and monitor zombie foreclosures. The partnership will enlist Columbia Law School students to lend their research skills to local municipalities in the fight against zombie homes, providing resources those cities and towns might not otherwise have.

The partnership is the first of its kind, according to the announcement.

Here’s how it will work: municipalities will be able to submit a request on a specific vacant property via a website established for this specific purpose. Columbia Law Students will then research that home’s foreclosure status and report back with their findings. The research time will also count toward Columbia’s mandatory 40-hour pro bono requirements for law students.

“This new partnership with Columbia Law School is a substantial step towards riding communities of vacant and abandoned properties,” said Erie County Clerk Mickey Kearns. “There is a clear need for resources for our smaller municipalities, many of who want to take action on zombie properties, but don’t have the means to do it. Working with the bright students at Columbia Law School will give these municipal leaders the necessary information to track down banks and ensure these properties are being maintained.”

“We are pleased to partner in this innovative initiative with Erie County Clerk Michael P. Kearns and the Western New York Law Center with Joseph Kelemen and Kate Lockhart,” said Conrad Johnson, Clinical Professor of Law at Columbia University. “Zombie properties are a blighting influence throughout New York. By participating in this program, students at Columbia Law School can make a positive difference while fulfilling their responsibilities to serve the public.”

“We applaud the efforts of Columbia University in extending their expertise to Erie County,” said Robert Klein, Founder and Chairman of SecureView and Community Blight Solutions. “We hope that they will use free services like Compliance Connections to aid in their quest to rid Western New York of these nightmare neighborhoods. These Columbia Law students join fellow CU alumnae like Adam Zaranko, President of the New York Land Bank Association, and our own staff here at Community Blight Solutions, in the fight against blight.”

The New York towns of Boston and Evans are the first signed on to participate in the pilot program.