Kucinich vows a fight over Ohio's exclusion from federal mortgage assistance program

OhioChick

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Sun Feb-21-10 12:04 PM
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Kucinich vows a fight over Ohio's exclusion from federal mortgage assistance program

February 20, 2010, 6:11PM

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich said today he will ask the Obama Administration to reconsider its decision to exclude hard-hit Ohio from a new federal effort to help states cope with the housing foreclosure crisis.

The plan, announced Friday, reroutes $1.5 billion originally intended to help bail out troubled banks. Instead, the Troubled Asset Relief Program money will go to state housing agencies in California, Nevada, Florida, Arizona and Michigan, where it will be used to support new programs to keep homeowners from losing their properties.

Kucinich and other housing officials and advocates said today they were angry Ohio had been excluded, and mystified about the administration's rationale. Kucinich, who chairs the House's domestic policy subcommittee, said he will hold a hearing Thursday to seek answers.

"We expect a high-ranking Treasury Department official to be there," the Cleveland Democrat said. "I simply cannot understand an oversight of this magnitude. We're going to demand that be changed. We're not going to let Ohio be shoved aside.

Kucinich, Cuyahoga County Treasurer Jim Rokakis and Cuyahoga County Foreclosure Prevention Program director Paul Bellamy said there are numerous, compelling reasons why Ohio should have qualified for the TARP money.

In the fourth quarter of 2009,15.7 percent of all Ohio mortgage-holders were in foreclosure or their payments were more than a month past-due, according to a report last week by the Mortgage Bankers Association. The foreclosure/delinquency numbers rose steadily throughout last year.

The 89,053 commercial and residential foreclosures in Ohio in 2009 set a new record high.

In 2006, Cuyahoga County led the nation with 13,600 residential mortgage foreclosures. Projections indicate there will be 14,000 foreclosures this year.

Nearly half of all mortgages in Ohio are "underwater," meaning the amount the homeowner owes is greater than the house's market value.

According to a new analysis, Ohio ranks 48th of 50 states in terms of how effectively homeowners in danger of foreclosure have been helped by the existing federal mortgage assistance program, known as Home Affordable Modification Program.

A White House news release said the five states chosen for the new federal assistance program each had average home values that had fallen more than 20 percent from their peak. Another criteria was that 12.5 percent of all mortgage payments in the state were more than 60 days delinquent.

In Ohio, "we're at 11.5 percent," Rokakis said. "You're telling me that, for one arbitrary percentage point, you're going to cut a state that's suffered more than any other in the country out of this program?"

Kucinich and others suggested that politics played a role in the president's decision to help states such as Nevada, where Senate majority leader Harry Reid faces a tough re-election fight. Obama unveiled the program in Las Vegas with Reid at his side.

"People act like just because this crisis has moved to the South and West, it's no longer an issue here," said Rokakis. "Time is running out. We're in deep, deep trouble."

Rokakis said census figures to be released next year will show the toll that the mortgage meltdown has taken on Ohio, and particularly Cleveland, which housing officials say is at the epicenter.

"The only county that will have lost more population than is Orleans Parish, and they had Hurricane Katrina," Rokakis said. "The loss of population in Cleveland is staggering. There is talk in City Hall that the population of Cleveland, which was 473,000 in 2000, may fall as low as 325,000 after the 2010 census is complete.

"Half of the home sales in Cleveland last year were sheriff's auctions," Rokakis said. "The billions of dollars of home equity that has been lost in this community is unlike any experience in this country."

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/02/kucinich_vows_a_fight_over_ohi.html

We're being left out here in Ohio?? :wtf: