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1) Re: 2009 House Bill 4453 (Impose new regulations on foreclosures ) [by Admin003 on April 5, 2009]
Senator Brater’s first statement is as follows:
I offer an amendment which will greatly enhance the effectiveness of this bill. What it does is establish a fund so that homeowners who are in foreclosure can have access to legal assistance and representation. I am acquainted with some attorneys who either on a pro-bono or greatly-reduced-fee basis are reaching out to homeowners in foreclosure or are in threat of foreclosure to represent them in the foreclosure proceedings process. Unfortunately, people who are in that situation don’t generally have funds to pay an attorney for fees that are incurred in this process.
What I am proposing here is that we establish a fund if there is a sale of a foreclosed property that the lender who benefited from that sale would take 1 percent of the proceeds from the winning bid and place it in a fund which would then create a legal fund for funding legal representation for borrowers who are in need of representation to protect them in the foreclosure process. I ask for your support of this amendment.
Senator Brater’s second statement is as follows:
I regret the terminology that was used to describe these amendments. They are based on consultation with experts in the field. Since the bills don’t get to the point of preventing foreclosure, but they only ask people to come together for mediation. It is kind of a Catch-22 situation. All we are trying to do is protect the homeowner here and make sure that any lender that tries to foreclose on their home actually has the right to do so.
Senator Brater’s third statement is as follows:
I rise to correct the record. In his remarks earlier in this debate, the Senator from the 17th District stated that this is a bipartisan package because it is the same package of bills that came over from the House. These are not the bills that came over from the House. The bills that came over from the House, had real teeth that would get bankers to the table to negotiate in good faith, including the threat of judicial foreclosure based on a filter laid out by the FDIC requirements of whether a loan should be eligible for that procedure.
These bills that we are voting on today are just a feel-good measure to say if you feel like it, you can get together with your banker and have a little chat. But that is where it is going to end unless the banker chooses to do otherwise. It is totally in the lender’s discretion at this point, and that is the current law. This bill does nothing to change that.
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Senator Clarke’s fourth statement, in which Senator Scott concurred, is as follows:
I do realize that many lawmakers who supported this package of bills had good intentions. I also acknowledge the fact that this Legislature has taken action to penalize financial institutions and financial officers who may not have acted appropriately. I also recognize the fact that the Legislature has taken action with the intent of preventing these problems from occurring in the future.
The fact is that there are people on the verge of losing their homes right now, and they need help right now. There are people in foreclosure right now and have the money to pay the lender, but the lender won’t accept it. There are people who have had their homes sold by the sheriff right now but still have the means to make some type of mortgage payment on an interim basis and pay their taxes. They need help now, not in the future.
These bills do not provide that type of relief from foreclosure right now. They are shams, and they should not be represented as providing relief to families because they don’t.
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Senator Gleason’s statement is as follows:
I rise in objection to this legislation as well, and as the chairman of the committee had mentioned that this was a bipartisan effort. It might have intended to be that way, but I don’t think it ended up that way.
Nearly 70 years ago, John F. Kennedy wrote one of his books about Why England Slept. That was the title of it, Why England Slept, leading up to World War II. There were those who just said they would turn their head the other way regardless of the atrocities that were happening to certain ethnic groups and the dividing up, and actually, the taking over of certain countries and lands.
My remarks are intended to inform the Senate that the questions today is why this chamber sleeps when record numbers of Michiganians are losing their homes. I have a particular concern about the component when we notify by mail those who have lost their homes or those who are in the stage of losing their homes. Here’s the trouble with that. I believe we’re leaving the most needful of the support behind. When we say that we are going to send a letter, we give them two weeks to mail and receive a letter. Consider this: the most needy will have weeks or months prior to the letter even being sent like maybe some of our older citizens and probably to a more frequent level, the younger families in the state; maybe because of the economic crisis and maybe because they can’t afford the mortgage payment; maybe they left their home where the letter is directed to because they couldn’t pay their water bill, or they couldn’t pay their heating bill, so they moved in with another family member. That is not a very serious attempt to send a letter through the mail to somebody who maybe had moved out of the residence because their water or heat was shut off. Every single one of us have received inquiries about how they can get their water and their heat turned back on this past winter. So many family members have moved in with others or with friends. How do they get that letter of notification to meet their obligations to get through this process and save their homes?
Once again, the question is why England slept or why this chamber slept when numbers of foreclosures are on the books today.
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