plus 4, Obama to banks: Ease lending to businesses - Cumberland Times-News

Obama to banks: Ease lending to businesses - Cumberland Times-News
Kenyan Native Admits to Role in Multistate Scam - ABC News
New Kensington keeps taxes steady with $7M budget - PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Mint.com Spending Data Affirms Predicted Growth for Big Brands - Stockhouse
Female vets face homelessness, dearth of services - Daily Citizen

Obama to banks: Ease lending to businesses - Cumberland Times-News

Posted: 15 Dec 2009 05:10 AM PST

Published: December 15, 2009 08:38 am

Obama to banks: Ease lending to businesses

Associated Press

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama challenged top bankers Monday to explore "every responsible way" to increase lending, saying they were obliged to help after being rescued by taxpayers. He asked them to "take a third and fourth look" at their small-business lending.

US Bancorp CEO Richard Davis told the group meeting at the White House that his bank would be willing to take a second look at every loan it rejects. And he said he would present the idea to other members of the Financial Services Roundtable — a group representing the largest financial companies, according to the Roundtable. Davis is its incoming chairman.

Obama, in a statement after more than an hourlong meeting with the executives, said he reminded them that much of the financial crisis that took the U.S. banking system to the brink of collapse had been "of their own making." He also exhorted the executives — both in private and in public — to drop their opposition to an overhaul of the nation's financial industry.

"If they wish to fight commonsense consumer protections, that's a fight I'm more than willing to have," Obama told reporters in the Diplomatic Reception Room of the executive mansion.

He also urged lenders to find creative ways to free up lending. Obama said banks have benefited from bailouts and should use that strength to lend more money to consumer and businesses.

"But given the difficulty business people are having as lending has declined and given the exceptional assistance banks received to get them through a difficult time," he said, "we expect them to explore every responsible way to help get our economy moving again."

Delay, he said, was not an option he was willing to consider as his administration has focused on digging out an economy that has left more than 15 million Americans out-of-work. An economy with double-digit unemployment next year threatens political fortunes for Obama's fellow Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections — and presumably even Obama himself in a 2012 re-election bid.

The president has sought to bolster Americans' confidence, talking often about accomplishments from the $787 billion economic stimulus package he sought early in his office and a potential follow-up jobs program to jump-start the economy.

"And so I urged these institutions here today to go back and take a third and fourth look about how they are operating when it comes to small business and medium-sized business lending," he said.

Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis pledged to Obama that his bank would lend $5 billion more to small- and mid-sized businesses in 2010 than it did in 2009, the bank said. It said the move is part of the bank's broader effort to support an economic recovery.

JPMorgan said last month that it would boost such lending by $4 billion.

Obama's stern lecture came hours after Citigroup Inc. said that it was repaying $20 billion in bailout money it received from the Treasury Department, in an effort to reduce government influence over the banking giant. The government will also sell its stake in the company.

The New York-based bank was among the hardest hit by the credit crisis and rising loan defaults and got one of the largest bailouts of any banks during the financial crisis. The government gave it $45 billion in loans and agreed to protect losses on nearly $300 billion in risky investments. Wells Fargo & Co. remains the last national bank that has yet to pay back its bailout money.

Despite Obama's pointed words, the bankers have said that lending is limited by factors beyond their control: The sluggish economy and tighter oversight by regulators. The slow economy has businesses reluctant to expand — and makes banks more grim about their prospects. Loan applications are down.

Meanwhile, regulators are telling banks to be more skeptical about potential borrowers. They are forcing banks to keep larger cushions of capital to protect against future losses. That means there's less money available to lend.

The meeting came amid Obama's fierce criticism of Wall Street. In an interview that aired on Sunday, Obama rebuked executive paychecks at firms that only last year required tax dollars to keep their doors open.

"I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of fat cat bankers on Wall Street," Obama told CBS's "60 Minutes."

Bankers brushed off Obama's harsh rhetoric.

Davis, of US Bancorp, denied that there was any rancor after Obama's "fat cats" comment.

"It was an opportunity for the president to make clear how important some of these issues are," he told reporters in the White House driveway. "We haven't done as good a job as we can in the future to align the interests of our constituents with those of the American public."

After House passage of a regulatory overhaul Friday, the work now shifts to the Senate, which has been preoccupied with health care legislation.

Obama said rhetoric and reality on financial overhaul don't align.

"The problem is, there's a big gap between what I'm hearing here in the White House and the activities of lobbyists on behalf of these institutions or associations of which they're a member up on Capitol Hill," Obama said.

"I urged them to close that gap, and they assured me that they would make every effort to do so."

Davis said Obama talked about the difference between bankers' broad support of the financial overhaul and the strident objections raised by their industry groups and lobbyists.

"We think there was probably a disconnect as well," Davis said. "We're going to do a better job, beginning with the CEOs, to work with the lobbyists directly and be the voice with those administration leaders to come to a conclusion that we haven't before."

Banks, industry groups and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce have uniformly rejected the administration's proposal to create a new Consumer Financial Protection Agency. Some have proposed alternatives that consumer groups believe would defang the proposed agency.

Monday's remarks were the first to suggest that the opposition did not reflect the bankers' positions.

"I think that the disagreement over (the consumer agency) has sort of colored much of the debate and overshadowed" industry's support for other parts of Obama's financial overhaul, said Kenneth Bentsen, who heads the Washington office of the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association.

There has been no shortage of contact between the bankers and the groups that have campaigned against parts of the administrations financial overhaul. The Financial Services Roundtable is in conversation with the CEOs it represents multiple times a week, its leaders have said. SIFMA's leadership, which includes lobbyists, speaks at least once a week with its board — including top executives from Goldman Sachs and other big banks.

———

Associated Press writer Jim Kuhnhenn contributed to this report.

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Kenyan Native Admits to Role in Multistate Scam - ABC News

Posted: 15 Dec 2009 06:22 AM PST

A woman told a federal judge that she was following orders from coconspirators in her native Kenya when she helped dupe West Virginia's auditor out of nearly $1 million.

Angella Muthoni Chegge-Kraszeski pleaded guilty Monday in Charleston's U.S. District Court to a felony conspiracy charge, admitting to a role in what prosecutors believe was a multimillion-dollar, Internet-aided scam that also targeted at least three other states.

The scheme diverted money that was supposed to go to businesses that provided consulting and other services to public agencies, investigators allege.

Five Kenyan-born men, like Chegge-Kraszeski also living in the U.S., were indicted in the case last month. Married to a U.S. citizen in North Carolina, she faces a prison term and possible deportation at a May 11 sentencing. All six defendants remain jailed.

The slight, soft-spoken 33-year-old said her role in the plot began late last year, while she was visiting her teenage son in Kenya. A man she said she knew only as "Jimmy" had her photo taken for what turned out to be a false South African passport that gave her the alias "Christina Ann Clay."

With it, Chegge-Kraszeski said she set up dummy corporations in North Carolina and bank accounts both there and in Minnesota under names nearly identical to those of legitimate state government vendors. The conspirators then sought to trick public officials into sending payments for the legitimate companies' services to these bogus entities.

West Virginia's auditor was hit for nearly $2 million. Chegge-Kraszeski admitted to helping defraud the state out of nearly half that amount. The charges filed against the other five allege the scam also bilked $1.2 million from Massachusetts, $869,000 from Kansas and $301,000 from Ohio between March and July.

The other three states have reported recovering their funds. Chegge-Kraszeski said she wired most of her share of West Virginia's loss to bank accounts in Kenya. She said she also helped pass along $42,517 to defendant Albert E. Gunga and $27,550 to James Mwangi, mentioned in the November indictment but not charged.

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New Kensington keeps taxes steady with $7M budget - PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW

Posted: 15 Dec 2009 05:32 AM PST

New Kensington Council on Monday night formally adopted a nearly $7 million budget for next year that calls for no tax increase.

The rate for city property owners will remain at 27.03 mills to fund the $6.9 million spending program, which is slightly less than this year's total.

Council also voted to borrow $1.2 million to hold the city over until tax revenues start to come in. The tax anticipation note will be provided by PNC bank at a rate of 2.15 percent.

Citizens Bank provided a bid of 2.5 percent and First Commonwealth bid 2.49 percent. Parkvale provided a two-part bid at 2.25 percent, then added a 2 percent bid if the city agreed to use the bank as a depository.

"On its face, the 2.0 sound better," said Solicitor James Kopelman. "But with mandating the city use them as a general depository made it a conditional bid, and that's why I had to throw out that bid."

Citizens Bank will remain the depository for the city next year.

In other business:

• The reorganization meeting will be Jan. 4, when incoming Mayor Thomas Guzzo will be sworn in.

The meeting dates for next year, tentatively scheduled for the first Tuesday of every month, also will be decided.

• Council will buy an entry station ticket machine for $5,500 for the city parking lot along Fourth Avenue.

• Council renewed the custodial cleaning contract with Hunchar Cleaning Services for $22,570. That's an increase of $1,075 over this year's contract.

• A bid for a new fire truck from Four Guys totaled almost $390,000. The fire departments will review details of the proposal before final action is taken by council.

• Council thanked Carnetta Scruggs for her effort in organizing the recent Christmas parade and Santa Claus appearance. Scruggs thanked the 45 units that participated.

• Monday was outgoing Mayor Frank Link's final meeting before leaving office.

"It has been an honor and a privilege to serve as you mayor the past eight years," Link said. "We had a vision to concentrate on code enforcement, redevelopment, demolition and polishing our image. And we have done that, though I hoped we could have done more."

Link left council chambers to a standing ovation and Guzzo handled the public comment portion of the meeting.

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Mint.com Spending Data Affirms Predicted Growth for Big Brands - Stockhouse

Posted: 15 Dec 2009 06:07 AM PST

Retailers Who Trended Up Among Mint Users Leading Into Black Friday Made Good With Strong Kick-Off of the Holiday Shopping Season

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Dec 15, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) --

Mint.com (www.mint.com) from the makers of Quicken, a leading online personal finance service from Intuit Inc. (Nasdaq: INTU), today published aggregate holiday shopping data affirming positive pre-Black Friday predictions for a handful of bellwether retailers. Here's where bellwether merchants netted out, based on actual November 2009 spending among Mint.com's 1.8 million users:

Industry Indices Show Promise

Though down since the recession hit last fall, spending in General Shopping (Wal-Mart, Target, etc.), Clothing (Banana Republic, Macy's, etc.) and Electronics (Best Buy, RadioShack, etc.) all surpass spending in the same categories at this time last year -- with electronics showing the most dramatic rebound.

Leaders Leading into the Holidays

Though many retailers fully recovered from their recession lows, several saw significantly higher spending among Mint.com users this past month than they did in November 2008. Among them, six stood out for their strong performance leading into the holiday season:

-- Best Buy -- the electronics retailer saw an uptick of 18.3 percent this year over last

-- Sears -- the general retailer went up 12.6 percent this November over last

-- Fry's Electronics -- though behind competitor Best Buy, this electronics store also rebounded strongly, up 11.2 percent year-over-year

-- J.Crew -- this clothing retailer led the category, up 8.5 percent in sales in November 2009 over November 2008

-- Target -- a 7.5 percent uptick in year-over-year sales puts Target above competitor Wal-Mart

-- Aeropostale -- though the highest performer leading into November 2009, the clothing retailer does not currently lead retails sales among Mint.com users, but did perform 7.6 percent higher this year

Luxury Rebounds

After suffering through much of 2009, high-end retail sales are beginning to climb to pre-recession numbers, though pre-holiday spikes have started to flatten.

"Mint.com's anonymized, aggregate data from across our nearly 2 million users creates a unique economic index that can surface some interesting patterns," said Aaron Patzer, vice president and general manager of Intuit's Personal Finance Group. "Certain patterns help us realize the efficacy of the data; for example, the peak in electronics spending can be attributed in part to the close of Circuit City in the intervening months, helping to show that the rest of our data, and the patterns and trends it shows, is increasingly powerful as our user-base grows."

Sales numbers through November 2009 can be pulled by merchant and by city, state or region. To request these figures, please email: shelby@atomicpr.com.

About Mint http://www.mint.com

Mint.com from the makers of Quicken is a leading online personal finance service from Intuit Inc. (Nasdaq: INTU), providing over 1.8 million users a fresh, easy and intelligent way to manage their money. And it's free. Launched in September 2007, Mint.com has quickly grown to track nearly $200 billion in transactions and $50 billion in assets and has identified more than $300 million in potential savings for its users. Mint.com's innovation is in applying advanced technology to deliver breakthrough ease-of-use. Using patent-pending technology and proprietary algorithms, Mint.com allows users to see all their financial accounts in one place, makes it easy to set and keep to budgets, and helps identify money saving ideas. Mint.com is so effective that more than 90 percent of users say they have changed their financial habits as a result of using the service. For more information on Mint.com's free online personal finance service, please visit http://www.mint.com and follow Mint.com on Twitter: www.twitter.com/mint.

About Intuit Inc.

Intuit Inc. is a leading provider of business and financial management solutions for small and mid-sized businesses; financial institutions, including banks and credit unions; consumers and accounting professionals. Its flagship products and services, including QuickBooks(R), Quicken(R) and TurboTax(R), simplify small business management and payroll processing, personal finance, and tax preparation and filing. ProSeries(R) and Lacerte(R) are Intuit's leading tax preparation offerings for professional accountants. The company's financial institutions division, anchored by Digital Insight, provides on-demand banking services to help banks and credit unions serve businesses and consumers with innovative solutions.

Founded in 1983, Intuit had annual revenue of $3.2 billion in its fiscal year 2009. The company has approximately 7,800 employees with major offices in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, India and other locations. More information can be found at www.intuit.com.

SOURCE: Mint.com

Atomic PR for Intuit Personal Finance Group Martha Shaughnessy, 415-402-0230 martha@atomicpr.com

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Female vets face homelessness, dearth of services - Daily Citizen

Posted: 15 Dec 2009 05:39 AM PST

Published: December 15, 2009 09:09 am

Female vets face homelessness, dearth of services

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) — The $15,000 that former Army Pvt. Margaret Ortiz had in the bank when she left Iraq is long gone, spent on alcohol and cocaine.

By the time she found her way to a program run by the nonprofit U.S. Vets for homeless female veterans in this Southern California city, she'd slept in San Diego on the beach or anywhere she could find after a night of partying. One morning, she woke up behind a trash bin, her pants torn, with no memory of what happened.

Instead of helping her forget her six months in Iraq, where she said she faced attacks on her compound and sexual harassment from fellow soldiers, the alcohol and drugs brought flashbacks and raging blackouts. She said she tried to kill herself.

"You knew something was wrong with you, but you didn't know what was wrong with you," said Ortiz, 27, from atop her twin bed in a plain dorm-style room, a black 4th Infantry Division ball cap on her head. "Nobody knew, and so you couldn't really handle it."

Ortiz is one of the new faces among America's homeless veterans.

They're younger than homeless male veterans and more likely to bring children. Their number has doubled in the past decade, and there are an estimated 6,500 homeless female veterans on any given night — about 5 percent of the total homeless veterans population.

But women-only programs such as the one Ortiz participates in are few.

"It is always hard to find a place or resources or help when you are homeless," said Sen. Patty Murray, a member of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee. "It is almost impossible if you are a woman. Most of the VA facilities cater to men, and you can't take a mom with two little kids and put her in the middle of a homeless center with 30 or 40 male veterans," said Murray, D-Wash.

The distressed economy only made things worse.

"People think we're just coming out of the military and we should have our stuff together," said Tiffany Belle, 33, a former Navy sailor who served in the Philippines after the Sept. 11 attacks and lives with Ortiz at the U.S. Vets program. "It gets really hard. Some people don't know where to go, what to do."

Like male veterans, many homeless female veterans face substance abuse and mental health problems. Many also struggle with sexual trauma that occurred in their childhood, in the military, or elsewhere.

Ortiz said she was the victim of childhood sexual trauma. In Iraq, she said she dealt with harassment from male soldiers who talked to her like she was a prostitute. She was a driver and her convoys regularly were attacked, she said.

She said she's particularly bothered by an incident in which she was 40 feet from a building destroyed by a mortar where she was living in Tikrit.

A few months after she returned to the U.S., she was back in California, with plans to go to college, living with her parents and burning through her money on drugs and alcohol.

She eventually ended up in a psychiatric hospital after attempting suicide, and later in in-treatment programs for drugs and sexual trauma.

"I didn't know how to process it and I didn't know what to process because there was so much of it," she said.

During difficult economic times, even those who haven't yet cut ties from the military can face homelessness.

Sgt. Alta Jackson, 58, joined the Army nearly 30 years ago, and remains in the Reserves while she lives at the U.S Vets site. Before she deployed to Iraq in 2005, she said she lost her job as a custodian. Stationed south of Baghdad, she said her camp endured almost nightly attacks that destroyed structures near her and left fellow soldiers wounded.

Back home from war, she was taking care of her ailing father in his 90s and the two lived on his pension. After his death, she bounced from relative to relative, some of whom were getting evicted amid the housing crisis. Everywhere she looked for work, she was turned down.

"People just don't want to hire you because you're too old," Jackson said.

At the same time, she was angry and depressed. Once outgoing, she told family members not to come see her unannounced.

"Everyone was telling me that I've changed," Jackson said. "I remember telling them, quit telling me I've changed because I haven't changed. I'm the same. You guys have changed."

She continues to look for work. Her car was repossessed while she was deployed, so she's had to relearn how to take the train or bus to look for jobs. She faces the possibility of getting deployed again and worries about the future.

"Sometimes I feel really good about it and I'm upbeat," said Jackson. "Sometimes, when I sit and think about certain things, I get depressed. I get discouraged because it's really hard to say what the future holds."

The program where the women live is one of fewer than 10 nationally that receives money from the Department of Veterans Affairs to provide care in specialized programs for homeless women veterans. It provides housing, but also employment help and treatment for sexual trauma.

Administrators had worked with male veterans for years and assumed the same types of programs worked for women. They quickly learned when they opened the women's program in 2001 that the women's issues were more complex and required longer treatment.

"They really have different ways of dealing with things," said Dr. Diane West, a nurse and therapist who administers the program.

They also found that men and women in the same structure didn't work. A majority of the women had experienced sexual trauma and craved privacy. Some became involved with the men, which complicated their treatment. They were moved to their own building in 2005.

Today, it offers 38 beds for women without children and recently expanded to add rooms for eight women with children. West has gotten calls from women needing help from as far away as Massachusetts. Among those calling for help, West said, was an Iraq veteran with a 3-month old.

Recently, VA Secretary Eric Shinseki pledged to advocates to end homelessness among veterans in five years, and specifically mentioned the need to help women veterans.

The VA is far more proactive than it's ever been, and recognizes the need to be more family friendly, said Pete Dougherty, director of VA's homeless veterans programs. It supports legislation sponsored by Murray that seeks to expand government dollars to programs that target women veterans and the children of the homeless.

It also wants to expand on a partnership between the VA and the Department of Housing and Urban Development that provides permanent housing in public housing and ongoing case management treatment services for veterans.

It "makes it much more appealing for a woman veteran because that woman veteran doesn't have to lose care and custody and control of their children in order to access and obtain services from us," Dougherty said.

The VA's on the right track, but in today's economy, it will be a tough task, said Steve Berg, vice president for programs and policy at the National Alliance to End Homelessness.

In upcoming months, Ortiz plans to leave U.S. Vets where she continues treatment, and in January she plans to enter Long Beach City College on the new GI Bill. She said she no longer hangs out with a drug-using crowd, and instead finds companionship with other veterans.

Her fear is that she will lose control of her post-traumatic stress disorder and her life will take a downward spiral, possibly even leaving her on the streets.

"What makes me think that I'm not like the Vietnam veteran that just like one day snaps and does a flashback and is down in the dumps again?" Ortiz said.

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On the Net:

U.S. Vets: http://www.usvetsinc.org/

Department of Veterans Affairs: http://www.va.gov/

National Alliance to End Homelessness: http://www.endhomelessness.org/

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