Home-Rule Foreclosure Law

Article in the newspaper today, click here. This makes no sense at all. If there was predatory foreclosing happening then I would agree with a moratorium, but that is not the case right now.

Loss mitigation units of mortgage companies are bending over backwards to come up with solutions to help the current home-owner. The last thing mortgage holder wants is another foreclosed property. At the same time there are some home-owners, who have just plain given up. Now the bank does not even have the ability to take owenership of the house for six months if this is passed.

"Just cause" evictions only. Why do we not hold the same standard for the three tenants next to the Hanover? Answer, they are tenants at wills. That means either party can end the tenancy with a 30 day notice. Do we really want the City of Worcester deciding on whether someone can exercise their own property rights?

Will this tighten the already tight credit markets in Worcester if the City of Worcester passes? One would think so when I read that a mandated review by the Superior Court or Housing of the foreclosure that will allow the judge to modify the mortgages?

Whatever happened to responsibility? There is a reason you need to sign your name 20 times to hundreds of pages of paperwork when you got the mortgage. If you do not understand everything then you should have hired a lawyer.

Everyone has good intentions on this but this idea makes no sense and will only make the situation worse.

Airport Commission May Meeting

Random thoughts;

• Have you ever been on a board where you did not receive the budget numbers, especially when you are losing $2,000,000 dollars per year.
• No monthly marketing report, per usual, and for now almost three years not one mention of ongoing discussion with any prospective airlines.
• We do, however, have a review of old negotiations with Skybus, an airline that is no longer in business?
• No discussion of the request to send information to Avports.
• No discussion of negotiations with MassPort.
• No discussions of the lone bidder for the land parcel last year.
• IMG? We have paid them over $100,000 and we never ever get an update on them.

Hyannis AIrport

Saw a story about a Hyannis Airport Commission meeting in the Barnstable Patriot. Lets hope Worcester follows their example when our 20 Year Master Plan is finally released.

Downgrade To GA

Mentioned this last week, but might as well do it again. If the City Manager believes we can have ownership transferred to MassPort via outright sale or long-term lease in fiscal 2009, we should not downgrade now. Now, the city administration should prepare an analyis as to how much we can save if we were to downgrade per the recommendation of IMG in their $100,000 study.

In October/November if the prospects do not look good with MassPorts or another entity (Avports) and we do not have commercial service then we should take a look at the report detailing how much we can save by the downgrade and have a vote.

Linear Air

Announcing NEW Lower Rates! We think the numbers speak for themselves. Check out sample one-way pricing for the Eclipse 500 jet below.

OLD Pricing, Philadelphia, PA to East Hampton, NY: $4,905.97
NEW $2,691.82 ($897 per person with 3 passengers)

OLD Pricing, Teterboro, NJ to Boston, MA: $6,160.03
NEW $4,112.98 ( $1,371 per person with 3 passengers)

OLD Pricing, Morristown, NJ to Nantucket, MA: $6,187.70
NEW $3,756.29 ($1,252 per person with 3 passengers)

See for yourself. For more Eclipse and Cessna Caravan sample pricing visit http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001xba-w_pSzx9ve-Mp6gdTQc0yH54XlHAZdcItPr70GvZPryCP73z0xy3FjZjrcpcUUs_exvfsnMLt2mtIj0c_P5aztAut4fA4Z27_t3xO8h8= and use Quick Quote (TM), our new online quoting tool. Air Travel is changing rapidly, but not for the better. Prices are outrageous, fees and fuel are sky high and customer service is at an all time low - but now you have a choice. Air Taxi service is becoming an increasingly popular solution for airline and private air travelers who are desperate for convenience, comfort and great service at affordable rates. Next time you fly, book a personal Air Taxi with Linear Air and get back to enjoying air travel. For more information, visit http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001xba-w_pSzx9ve-Mp6gdTQc0yH54XlHAZdcItPr70GvZPryCP73z0xy3FjZjrcpcUUs_exvfsnMLt2mtIj0c_P5aztAut4fA4Z27_t3xO8h8=. For bookings, contact Customer Service at customerservice@linearair.com or call 877-2-LINEAR (877-254-6327 x 2).

William Herp
PresidentLinear Air

May Board Minutes

Click here.

• Members were briefed on the Skybus negotiations from August, 2005 thru January, 2008. The board members were never briefed about any of this until now?
• Master Plan is ready but still not released

Foreclosure Moratorium Part 3

Any give me an example of how this would help?

Myrtle Beach Direct

One of the airlines on our watch list. They seem to be holding their own and new destinations like St Pete's and Montreal have been added. Cities they fly from are very ORH:

1. Columbus
2. Newark
3. Scranton

Also start to see some news stories on a Casino Direct Air, we need to keep an eye on them.

Foreclosures Moratorium Part 2

Someone give me an example how this moratorium helps anything???

Currently loss mitigation departments of the mortgage companies are extremely aggressive and do anything possible to help the current home-owner and do not want to take the property back. Of course there are always going to be some home-owners that are just going to walk and not want to even try to work things out. Now we are telling these banks that they can not foreclose?

Seriously someone give me an example of how this helps anything??

Herald Story on Park

Story in the Herald on Young Park. Thanks Dave Z.

City Manager Grading Final Thoughts

I was just thinking how the City Manager is in the 2nd year of his five year contract. The fact that we gave the City Manager a 5 year contact doesn't it almost make the annual grading system irrelevent? What are we going to do fire the City Manager, have to keep paying him for the remainder of the contract and hire another City Manager?

Kudos To David Moore

If you read the attachment in last night's City Council agenda (9B) regarding the "moratorium", City Solicitor Moore points out the "unintended consequences" and how this passage could actually make the foreclosure process even longer.

Home Rule Petition

City Councilor discussed a home rule petition that would prevent a foreclosed owner from evicting a tenant for 180 days, unless there is just cause for the eviction. This is a very bad idea.

First of a foreclosed owner, typically a bank, does not want tenants and has every right to terminate a tenancy at will with a 30 day notice. That said a tenant still has rights in housing court. Bottom line a tenant given a 30 day notice by the foreclosed owner (the bank), as at least the 30 days and can usually stretch this out 2-4 months through the eviction process. Ask anyone, who has ever tried to evict a tenant through Housing Court.

Second at the end of six months what is going to happen? Answer: the bank will end the tenancy anyhow. What have we really accomplished? The underlying bank will not market the property until the house is empty so we have in essence slowed down the entire process and properties will end up in limbo now even longer.

The mortgage market is already tighten increasing cash down payments on multi families to 20%, how do you think lenders will feel that when they foreclose that they will not be able to evict tenants for six months. It can help. I can understant the good intentions of the people involved, but it will only make the situation even worse.

Lastly I find ironic that many people did not feel bad for three businesses that were asked to leave ( I agreed since they did not have leases), since they were tenants at will, but when a bank that has probably lost in excess of $100,000 wants to end their tenancy at wills?

City Manager's Scores

Have you ever watched the Olympics and wondered how they scored a gymnastic or skating event? That is how I feel when I see the City Manager's grade in the paper today. Maybe we can have Dick Button be a commentator during a City Council Meeting.

The thing that really amazes me, however, that in a 1-5 scoring system that many of the councilors have opted to break it down beyond the decimal point to tenths and even hundreths of a point. I got to ask what is the difference between getting a score of 3.7 versus 3.6, or better yet a score of 4.35? You got to love Councilor Clancy,however, not only does he use only whole numbers but he gave an 18 out of possible 20. I wish that I had him as teacher in high school.

On the serious side, I focus on Economic Development. Councilor Rushton gave him the lowest grade of a 3 and I am not sure if it should even be that high. On the other end, a 4.5 for economic development on the high end, am I missing something? Imagine if City Square, South Worcester Industrial Park, Worcester Univercity Partnership., the NRSA program and ORH were successful, what score would he get then?

Versus keeping this inane system, maybe the City Councilors should vote once per year on the City Manager either 1) you keep the job or 2) you are fired. Either the job is getting done or it is not. This grading system is a complete waste of time.

WoMag on Skating Rink

Click here

Thanks Jahn

Nick K

Warning!! Warning!! It is not Harry Tembenis in the paper, but me. Check out Nick K Story today in the Telegram. Believe me I do not do the blog or website to see my name in the paper, but truly believe transportation issues like the airport and reliable commuter service are the keys to the future success of Worcester.

To that end, I would like to thank Nick for helping get the word out on the "alternative ownership models". In the end MassPort may be our best option, but it is not our only option and we have a fiduciary responsibility to market the airport to anyone who may be interested in ORH like Avports, National Express, etc. Imagine a hug ad in the Wall Street Journal advertising our AIRPORT FOR SALE!

Now for downgrade to General Aviation recommendation, let me make a slight adjustment.

If the City Manager truly believes that we can finalize the future of ORH in fiscal 2009 then we should hold off on this for the time being. Why? A potential suitor like MassPort may want and need a Part 129 certified airport. Bottom line, leave the decision up to the new owner or manager of ORH. In the very least, the City Council should request a report from the administration asking how much would be saved to downgrade, as recommended in the $100,000 IMG report.

Our best possible shot to commercial service is Florida. If you were an airline, you would want to target November-March as your peak months. If that is the case then you would need to have everything locked up by September.

If four months (October-November) from now, we:

1. Do not have commercial service to Florida.
2. The City Manager tells us prospects do not look good to sell or lease ORH.

We will have the numbers from the administration calculating the savings to downgrade to GA and decide. Who knows maybe by then we will even have the 20 Year Airport Master Plan.

Lastly I noticed that Winward is no longer listed on the Airport Website so evidently they did not exercies their lease option on the parcel that they won last year and had asked for an extension into this year.

49B Housing in Worcester

Check this out!!

Worcester has 13.50% of housing is considered 40B, well above the state minimum of 10% based on March 2006. Wonder where we are at now and where we will be after all the developments on the drawing board are done. Maybe we can catch Springfield--17.3%.

Illegal immigrants over 20% based on 2000 census numbers.

All Powerful Jahn

Today's front page story in the Telegram , as blogged here when Jahn dropped me a line on May 30th. Beware of the Jahn, he is everywhere.

Now for his latest. The Blackstone Visitor Center is coming in many millions, as high as 10 million?, over budget thus no construction has started.

Linear Air at ORH

There is a story in the Telegram, that I can not find the link, but Dave Zimage sent me a link to NECN. There were other planes.

Great story, but was anyone aware of this event? Yesterday was a great opportunity to market the general aviation possibilities of ORH to potential passengers and businesses. Why wasn't this event marketed in advance?

PIP Shelter

What does City Manager O'Brien mean when he says "it will take 30-50 more permanent new housing units". Let me get this right. We have a tough time monitoring one PIP shelter so we want to replace it with 30-50 smaller PIP's spread all around the City of Worcester?

I do not get it..