The first day of the Occupy Wells Fargo Vigil to Stop Evictions on March 25, 2013, was a smashing success! Five of us gathered to demand that Wells Fargo stop foreclosing on and evicting our neighbors with their illegal, predatory, or discriminatory loans. Before we even arrived, they had covered up the Wells Fargo stagecoach — the Wells Fargo “family jewels” as it were — so that we couldn’t have nice photo ops of protestors and the stagecoach. Personally, I like the photo op of them being silly enough to cover up the stagecoach for five protestors much better! (see photo on the right and videos below)
We look forward to continuing the vigils this week and ongoing until Wells Fargo stops their illegal, predatory, or discriminatory foreclosures and evictions of folks like our neighbor Bernetta Adolph, a disabled senior retired Muni employee.
Foreclosure and Eviction Fighters and their supporters have started a nonviolent vigil to stop all predatory, illegal, or discriminatory evictions. The vigil takes place on the sidewalk in front of the stagecoach at Wells Fargo headquarters, 420 Montgomery Street in San Francisco and will spread to bank branches and mortgage centers throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Please join us!
Sign Up for April 2013 Vigils
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Things were cooking — good food and good times — down at the ACCE Silent Auction and Community Recognition Ceremony at the I.T. Bookman Center on the evening of March 23, 2013. Folks bid on all kinds of donated items and raised a good chunk of cash for the work to stop the banks’ predatory foreclosures and evictions in our communities. We also honored some community heroes and enjoyed some excellent company.
Here are the people who were recognized:
Ailed Paningbatan, Director of Community Engagement, Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center (by Buck)
Antoine Perry, Program Coordinator, One-Stop (by Nealie)
Steve Phillips and Susan Sandler, Community Activists (by Bernetta)
Palestine Tyson, Retired Civil Service Worker, Community Activist (by Gale)
A dozen supporters joined Peter and Linnea Fairfield-Sweet in protesting Wells Fargo’s foreclosure auction of their Glen Park home in San Francisco. No auction investors were willing to pay the $630,000 opening bid, so the property went back to Wells Fargo.
Auctioneer Thomas of Lender Processing Services / Agency Sales and Posting (LPS/ASAP) read postponements and cancellations.
Auctioneer Thomas of Lender Processing Services / Agency Sales and Posting (LPS/ASAP) read postponements and cancellations.
Auctioneer Steve Neil of Cal Agent Services read postponements and cancellations. Auctioneer ??? read postponements and cancellations.
Auctioneer sold 170 Staples Avenue back to the lender ???? for $584.415.03.
Auctioneer Steve Neil of Cal Agent Services provided status on sales.
Auctioneer Steve Neil of Cal Agent Services provided status on sales.
Auctioneer Steve Neil of Cal Agent Services sold 1626 32nd Avenue to auction investor Stephen Florida on behalf of Growth Investment One LLC for $775,000.01 (lender JP Morgan Chase).
Auctioneer Steve Neil of Cal Agent Services provided status on sales.
Auctioneer Steve Neil of Cal Agent Services provided status on sales.
Auctioneer Steve Neil of Cal Agent Services sold Peter Fairfield and Linnea Sweet’s home at 831 Chenery Street bank to the lender Wells Fargo (opening bid $630,000).
To: brenda.wright@wellsfargo.com, alfredo.pedroza@wellsfargo.com, ruben.pulido@wellsfargo.com, john.g.stumpf@wellsfargo.com Cc: action@occupybernal.org Subject: Stop the March 19 Foreclosure Auction of Peter Fairfield and Linnea Sweet’s Home (loan# 1100225238)
Dear Wells Fargo staff,
Please take IMMEDIATE action to stop the March 19 foreclosure auction of Peter Fairfield and Linnea Sweet’s home at 831 Chenery Street (America’s Servicing Company loan# 1100225238) in San Francisco’s Glen Park neighborhood and offer them a fair deal loan modification.
The Fairfield-Sweet family accessed their home equity to save their photography business with a predatory loan that a mortgage broker assured them they could refinance when payments skyrocketed. But that turned out to be false once the economic crisis set in. Now that their family business is secure, Peter and Linnea (who is disabled) are seeking to live out the rest of their senior years with a loan modification that has affordable payments so they can remain in their home.
Please also meet the demands for each of the 32 families who Wells Fargo has put at risk of foreclosure and eviction and stop dual tracking by continuing to list foreclosure auctions while negotiating loan modifications.
Stop contributing to the rash of deaths by foreclosure! Stop the single-minded greedy focus on profit! Stop ignoring the health and well-being of your customers and the communities where we live! Take whatever action is necessary to keep distressed families in their homes!
This is an URGENT request, so please respond right away.
Sincerely,
your name here
Background:
When their photography business got dot-commed out of a SOMA office building with 30 days notice to vacate, Peter Fairfield and Linnea Sweet decided to access their home equity to save their main source of income. A mortgage loan broker convinced them that a sub-prime loan with escalating payments could easily be refinanced when the payments ballooned, so they thought their problems were solved. But the economic downturn made a refi impossible and Wells Fargo (America’s Servicing Company) foreclosed on their home of 33 years. Peter and Linnea are seeking a fair deal loan modification from Wells Fargo so that they and their dog Dagmar can remain in their home.
Wells Fargo is #1 in San Francisco foreclosures. San Francisco’s Mayor and Board of Supervisors have unanimously requested a halt to foreclosures and related evictions, especially since San Francisco Assessor-Recorder’s report showing that 84% of foreclosures have at least one legal violation and due to Wells’ $175 million settlement paid to resolve allegations of racial discrimination in providing mortgage loans in San Francisco’s Bayview-Hunters Point and other neighborhoods.
Wells Fargo’s “waterfall” model, along with similar policies from other lenders, ensures that the bank can squeeze the most money possible from homeowners struggling to make payments while finally discarding them like trash if the bank can’t make a profit on every single loan. Running a mortgage loan business means assuming risks, especially after receiving billions in bailout funds from the taxpayers, many of whom are Wells’ mortgage loan borrowers.
On March 15, 2013, few dozen protestors from the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, Occupy Bernal, Occupy Noe and other organizations protested PNC Bank’s seventh attempt to evict disabled senior Yin Wong from her San Francisco Bayview home even though she made all her payments on time. The Foreclosure and Eviction Fighters and their supporters shut down the entrances to the PNC Bank branch on the 28th floor of 575 Market Street, as well as access to the rest of the building except through a loading dock on the rear side of the building. The group demanded that PNC Bank cancel the eviction and sell Yin Wong her home.
PNC Bank plans to evict Foreclosure and Eviction Fighter Yin Wong and her family from their home in Bayview. We have to stop them!
Please take action with these steps to save their home:
NOTE: PNC Bank has been blacklisting email addresses, so if you can send your email from another email address please do so.
1) Call and email these PNC staff with the message below:
PNC CEO James E. Rohr right now at 412-762-2294 (may transfer to Executive Complaint Office voicemail) or 412-963-6133 (home)
PNC Bank President William Demchak at 917-348-1173 (cell)
PNC Senior Vice President Thomas Hyland at 212-527-3938
PNC Bank Vice President of Corporate Communications Fred Solomon at 412-762-7544
To: james.e.rohr@pnc.com, james.rohr@pnc.com, bill.demchak@pnc.com, thomas.hyland@pnc.com, frederick.solomon@pnc.com Cc: alisa.winslow@pnc.com, alok.satyawadi@pnc.com, andrew.siwulec@pnc.com, angela.gammage@pnc.com, barbara.martocci@pnc.com, barbara.stuck@pnc.com, catherine.bernard@pnc.com, dale.klose@pnc.com, daniel.potter@pnc.com, david.aloise@pnc.com, deborah.vanvalkenburgh@pnc.com, ginger.siegel@pnc.com, jerry.furby@pnc.com, joel.roediger@pnc.com, john.robinson@pnc.com, john.turner@pnc.com, joseph.chasteen@pnc.com, karen.larrimer@pnc.com, kevin.scheffler@pnc.com, kim.mcneil@pnc.com, laura.watson@pnc.com, liz.kuonen@pnc.com, lou.stempkowski@pnc.com, michael.delgado@pnc.com, michael.golden@pnc.com, michael.ley@pnc.com, robert.andres@pnc.com, sam.colton@pnc.com, sean.costello@pnc.com, susan.campbell@pnc.com, william.lashbrook@pnc.com, action@occupytheauctions.org Subject: Stop Eviction and Sell Yin Wong (#0002043106) Her Family Home
Dear PNC,
Please postpone the seventh eviction attempt you’ve scheduled for March 6, and sell San Francisco resident Yin Wong and her daughter Wai Cheung (PNC mortgage customer loan #0002043106) their family home in Bayview. After PNC purchased their mortgage loan from National City Mortgage, they received no notification of the purchase so their EFT payment didn’t make it to PNC, which rapidly foreclosed on their home and has tried six times to evict them. They have always paid and been prepared to pay their mortgage, so please negotiate with them and settle this matter fairly.
3) Stay tuned for 6:00am Wednesday home eviction defense at Yin Wong’s home, which may last all day. Those who wish to commit civil disobedience (i.e. take an arrest) may have the opportunity to do so, although anyone who doesn’t want to risk arrest may of course also participate.
Background
PNC Bank is stealing the home of Yin Wong, disabled senior by ILLEGALLY foreclosing on her and her family after National City Mortgage sold the loan on her home to PNC Bank. The first she heard of PNC’s purchase of the loan was a foreclosure notice in the mail. Even though Yin Wong has the money to pay the loan and has tried to get PNC Bank to accept it, PNC has refused and has pushed eviction proceedings forward even after four prior court appearances during which the Superior Court judge urged PNC to correct the problem. Yin Wong has tried over and over to work with PNC, but PNC has refused to work with her.
PNC Bank did the exact same thing with the Cruz family in Minneapolis… thousands of people have protested their eviction, organizing to re-occupy their home with dozens of arrests.
Let’s stand together to fight back and let banks know that we won’t let them foreclosure on families illegally.
JOIN US AND DEMAND PNC WORK WITH YIN TO KEEP HER HOME!!!
To get involved or for more information, call Grace at ACCE at +1-415-377-6872 or email gmartinez@calorganize.org
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 14, 2013
Contact: Peter Kuhns, (213) 272-1141
Homeowners Shut Down Keynote Speech by CEO of Wells Fargo Bank
Single mom led fifty community members onto the stage to confront Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf
Carlsbad, CA – Today, dozens of homeowners and supporters joined Betty Badro in confronting Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf at a banker’s conference on the day before her home of 19 years is scheduled to be foreclosed. Ms. Badro, who has worked for the State of California for 22 years, attempted to deliver a personal check to Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf while he was giving a keynote address at the American Banker Retail Lending Conference at a luxury beach resort hotel in Carlsbad, California.
Picture of Betty Badro confronting John Stumpf: http://bit.ly/ZDan9A
Video of protest: http://youtu.be/LEwpc1XL4r4
Betty has spent months attempting to get Wells Fargo to consider her for a loan modification. Betty lives with her disabled brother and one of her two children, and suffered recent financial setbacks due to state furloughs and personal health issues. Her finances have now recovered, a HUD-certified housing counselor has reviewed her case, and believes that Ms. Badro qualifies for a loan modification.
Ms. Badro took the stage, shook hands with Mr. Stumpf, and proceeded to explain that his bank was poised to take her home the next day. She told Mr. Stumpf that she can afford the mortgage and had a check in hand that she was asking him to accept. Not saying another word, Mr. Stumpf turned his back on Ms. Badro and left the stage. The group of homeowners took over the stage and made a presentation outlining how Wells Fargo has failed the community and the changes that Wells Fargo should make in their foreclosure practices.
“I’ve been working hard all my life,” says Betty Badro, member of ACCE. “I have income, I want to pay my mortgage, I just want a modification with principal reduction so that I can stay in my home. It is everything to me. John Stumpf and Wells Fargo are raking in money – they just had their most profitable year ever – but they’re profiting off the homes and livelihoods of American families.”
The event was organized by the ACCE Home Defenders League; and included the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE), the Home Defenders League, and Occupy Fights Foreclosures.
Thursday’s event was part of a broader campaign of ACCE and the Home Defenders League to push Wells Fargo to change their practices in order to reduce foreclosures. The groups are calling on Wells Fargo to:
• Make principal reduction a core front-end strategy when considering loan modifications;
• Release data on race & income of the homeowners they foreclose on, evict or assist.
• Stop all foreclosures and evictions stop until these steps are put into place.
On Tuesday, March 12th a report was released documenting the devastating impact on homeowners, communities and the economy unless Wells Fargo reverses its course and averts some or all of their impending foreclosures. Click here to see the report: devastating impact of Wells Fargo’s foreclosure pipeline. The report, California in Crisis: How Wells Fargo’s Foreclosure Pipeline Is Damaging Local Communities, was written by ACCE (Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment), the Center for Popular Democracy and the Home Defenders League.
The report uses data from Foreclosure Radar to look at loans currently in the foreclosure pipeline in California – meaning loans that have a Notice of Default or Notice of Trustee Sale. Of the 65,466 loans in the foreclosure pipeline, close to 20% of them are serviced by Wells Fargo.
Wells Fargo is servicing the most loans, but trails behind Bank of America and Chase when it comes to the amount of principal reduction given with first lien loan modifications, according to the Monitor of the multi-state Attorneys General settlement with the five big mortgage servicers.
NOTE: Impacted homeowners are available to speak to the press
ACCE is a statewide community organization of low and moderate income families and is a statewide anchor of the national Home Defenders League – a network of homeowners fighting back against Wall Street to save their homes. ACCE was a leader in pushing for the passage of the groundbreaking Homeowner Bill of Rights, passed in California in 2012, and along with the state Home Defenders League has saved thousands of families from foreclosures and evictions and has won tens of millions of dollars in principal reduction for families to reinvest in their communities.
ACCE, SEIU, Occupy Bernal, and Occupy Noe Foreclosure and Eviction Fighters and supporters again provided important testimony about the illegal, predatory, and discriminatory practices of banks like Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, and Bank of America at the meeting of the San Francisco Employee Retirement System Retirement Board on March 13, 2013, just as previously on January 9, 2013 and on February 13, 2013.
The group again asked the Retirement Board to investigate the illegal, predatory, and discriminatory practices of the banks, to request that the banks stop these practices, to sponsor shareholder resolutions if they don’t stop, and to divest from the banks’ stocks if the shareholder resolutions do not succeed. Some of the Commissioners responded favorably to the public comment testimony.
Grace Martinez of ACCE provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Foreclosure and Eviction Fighter Gladys Dewitt provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
SFERS Retirement Board President Wendy Paskin-Jordan, a former Wells Fargo employee, responds to public testimony.
San Francisco Muni employee and Local 200 former President Alice Fialkin provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Foreclosure and Eviction Fighter Ian Haddow provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Former San Francisco city employee Susan McDonough provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Foreclosure and Eviction Fighter Larry Faulks, evicted from his home by Wells Fargo, provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Foreclosure and Eviction Fighter and Teamster Ricardo Rodriguez provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Harry Baker, Retirement Security Chair for SEIU Local 1021, which is the largest union representing SFERS members, provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Foreclosure and Eviction Fighter Jackie Wright provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
Grace Martinez of ACCE provides testimony to SFERS Retirement Board.
SFERS Retirement Board staff and commissioners discuss whether they can calendar consideration of a resolution on foreclosures and related evictions at the next SFERS meeting in April 2013.
SFERS Retirement Board staff and commissioners continue discussing whether they can calendar consideration of a resolution on foreclosures and related evictions at the next SFERS meeting in April 2013.
The rest of the discussion was not captured on video.
#1 in SF Foreclosures and Related Evictions: Racist and Predatory
Who: (Retired and Current) City Employees, especially those facing foreclosure/eviction and supporters What: Public Comment at San Francisco Employees Retirement System (SFERS) Retirement Board Meeting (2 minute limit) When: 2:00pm, Wednesday, March 13 Where: 30 Van Ness Avenue, 3rd floor (near Market Street)
We are asking SFERS to do the following:
Investigate investments in Wells Fargo, which is #1 in foreclosures and related evictions in San Francisco and elsewhere, as well as other lenders foreclosing on and evicting San Francisco homeowners..
Prepare and submit a Wells Fargo shareholder resolution to stop predatory and/or racist foreclosures and related evictions for consideration at the next annual Wells Fargo shareholder meeting (probably in April 2013).
If Wells Fargo doesn’t adopt the shareholder resolution at its next shareholder meeting and take immediate steps to implement policies and practices in line with the resolution, then divest from any investment in Wells Fargo within three months after that shareholder meeting.
We are asking San Francisco Mayor Lee to do the following:
Appoint only qualified candidates to the SFERS Retirement Board who are not executives or employees at Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, or Bank of America (the top three in predatory foreclosures and related evictions in San Francisco).
Issue a statement in support of divestment from Wells Fargo of all San Francisco City and County funds, including employee retirement and disability funds.
Background:
The San Francisco Employee Retirement Systems (SFERS) handles investments for pension funds for current and retired San Francisco city employees. SFERS has policies that include “Social Investment Procedures” adopted at the SFERS Retirement Board meeting of September 27, 1988, which requires the SFERS Retirement Board when making investments in stocks, mutual funds, and so on, to consider:
“Community Relations: the relationship of the corporation to the communities in which it operates shall be maintained as a good corporate citizen through observing proper environmental standards, supporting the local economic, social and cultural climate, conducting acquisitions and reorganizations to minimize adverse effects and not discriminate in making loans or writing insurance.” (emphasis added by Occupy the Auctions)
Wells Fargo is #1 in San Francisco foreclosures. San Francisco’s Mayor and Board of Supervisors have unanimously requested a halt to foreclosures and related evictions, especially since San Francisco Assessor-Recorder’s report showing that 84% of foreclosures have at least one legal violation and due to Wells’ $175 million settlement with the United States Department of Justice paid in response to allegations of racial discrimination in providing mortgage loans in San Francisco’s Bayview-Hunters Point and other neighborhoods.
Wells Fargo’s “waterfall” model, along with similar policies from other lenders, ensures that the bank can squeeze the most money possible from homeowners struggling to make payments while finally discarding them like trash if the bank can’t make a profit on every single loan. Running a mortgage loan business means assuming risks, especially after receiving billions in bailout funds from the taxpayers, many of whom are Wells’ mortgage loan borrowers.
“On the morning of Dec. 19, 2012, in a Torrance courtroom, Larry Delassus’ heart stopped as he watched his attorney argue his negligence and discrimination case against banking behemoth Wells Fargo.
“His death came more than two years after Wells Fargo mistakenly mixed up his Hermosa Beach address with that of a neighbor in the same condo complex. The bank’s typo led Wells Fargo to demand that Delassus pay $13,361.90 — two years of late property taxes the bank said it had paid on his behalf in order to keep his Wells Fargo mortgage afloat.”
The first day of the Occupy Wells Fargo Vigil to Stop Evictions on March 25, 2013, was a smashing success! Five of us gathered to demand that Wells Fargo stop foreclosing on and evicting our neighbors with their illegal, predatory, or discriminatory loans. Before we even arrived, they had covered up the Wells Fargo stagecoach — the Wells Fargo “family jewels” as it were — so that we couldn’t have nice photo ops of protestors and the stagecoach. Personally, I like the photo op of them being silly enough to cover up the stagecoach for five protestors much better! (see photo on the right and videos below)
