Fwd: OTRP: Press Release: "OCCUPY ACTIVISTS CHALLENGE WELLS FARGO ON FORECLOSURES (Mon, Feb 6th)"

[Ronnie Garza]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Pete Thottam <petet...@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 10:40 AM
Subject: [IO-DA] Fwd: OTRP: Press Release: "OCCUPY ACTIVISTS CHALLENGE WELLS FARGO ON FORECLOSURES (Mon, Feb 6th)"
To: Richard Eskow <rje...@gmail.com>, "interoccdi...@googlegroups.com" <interoccdi...@googlegroups.com>, "occupyca...@googlegroups.com" <occupyca...@googlegroups.com>

See below.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Pete Thottam" <occupythe...@gmail.com>
Date: Feb 7, 2012 8:25 AM
Subject: OTRP: Press Release: "OCCUPY ACTIVISTS CHALLENGE WELLS FARGO ON FORECLOSURES (Mon, Feb 6th)"
To: "occupythe...@googlegroups.com" <occupythe...@googlegroups.com>
Cc: "Attorney General Kamala D. Harris Press Office" <newsa...@ag.ca.gov>, "news" <ne...@latimes.com>

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


OCCUPY ACTIVISTS CHALLENGE WELLS FARGO ON FORECLOSURES

Occupiers and Bank Executives Gather to Discuss the American Foreclosure Crisis


LOS ANGELES – In an unprecedented meeting, members of the Occupy
Movement in LA on Monday afternoon met with Wells Fargo Executives in
a conference room for the Center of Non-profit Management at the
California Endowment Building. Wells Fargo presented a contextual
history and foreclosure statistics via a PowerPoint presentation.
Occupy Activists presented challenges, concerns, questions, and
requests.



This gathering represents a first-of-its-kind meeting in the nation
where Bank Executives and Occupiers have come together to discuss
economic issues which helped spark the Occupy protests last fall.



The Occupy Activists originally thought they were invited to have a
serious discussion about possible remedial measures the bank can take
in the foreclosure-fraud crisis.  Wells Fargo seemed to be at the
meeting to present a “deck of slides” which highlighted their
“Responsible Lending and Servicing Principles”, along with numbers and
charts that represented their polished and packaged “home
preservation” or Loss Mitigation programs.



Wells Fargo had six Senior Executives meet with seven
foreclosure-focused activists.



Wells Fargo had first approached Pete Thottam and members of Occupy
the Rose Parade during their preparations in the Tournament of Rose
Parade.  Wells Fargo was the largest financial contributor of this
year’s parade and had two large floats in the procession.



After Wells Fargo had shown their presentation in the meeting about
the contextual history with regard to the current mortgage problems in
the U.S, Occupy members presented Wells Fargo with a sheet of 8
challenges.



Some of the challenges included an extended moratorium on foreclosures
to help innocent families until unemployment rates return to pre-2008
levels. Also included was a request for long-term relief to borrowers
by way of principal, interest rate, and payment reductions. In
addition, the Occupiers demand Wells Fargo fix lending practices to
eliminate discriminatory lending, i.e., “red lining” based off of age,
gender, and racial criteria.



As part of the 8 challenges, the Occupy Activists included 27 names of
families who face Wells Fargo foreclosures.



In addition, to the 8 written out challenges, Pete Thottam made a
request to have Wells Fargo issue a public apology and statement from
Wells Fargo’s CEO for the bank’s role in the current crisis.  Thottam
also asked for an additional $2 billion in principal write downs (in
addition to the $4 billion Wells Fargo has written down since 2009).



Wells Fargo was extremely cordial and offered light refreshment for
the meeting including fruit, cheese, (digestive) crackers, ice water,
tea, and coffee.  However, Well Fargo made no commitments and no less
than 3 of the Executives said they had to “digest” the challenges and
requests and get back to Occupy Activists.



“I guess that’s what the digestive crackers were there for,” said
Cheryl Aichele, an Occupy Activist in attendance, “It doesn’t surprise
me that Wells Fargo had nothing more than slides and snacks to offer
us.”



The conference room presentation by Wells Fargo seemed to contradict
the real-world experience of these foreclosure activists.  Carlos
Marroquin, a homeowner advocate and Occupy Activist, expressed the
frustration he encounters when assisting foreclosure victims.



“These innocent families are told their documents got lost, banks are
not returning their calls, and bank representatives are telling them
to go into delinquency to qualify for modifications,” stated
Marroquin.



“Our folks do not tell customers to go into default to qualify for
modifications,” said Joe Ohayon, Wells Fargo’s Senior Vice President
of Community and Client Relations charged with managing the overall
default servicing relationships with clients.



However, one of the camera men for a news station that attended the
press conference after the meeting had told the Occupy Activists about
his troubles with trying to modify his Wells Fargo loan and he said a
representative of the bank did tell him to default to qualify for a
modification.



This unprecedented meeting happened just as it was announced that
forty states had signed onto the robo-signing settlement.  California
State Attorney General Kamala Harris has stated the settlement is
insufficient for California.  Occupiers agree with Harris and rallied
last Friday to show their support for her decision.



During the Wells Fargo meeting with Occupy Activists the settlement came up.



Drew Collins, Senior Vice President and Sales Manager for Mortgages in
California, said “it is being hammered out by State AGs and it will be
settled.”



The $25 billion settlement to be split between 5 major banks does not
begin to address the 2 million Californian foreclosures that are
estimated to cost home owners, property taxes, and local governments
$650 billion statewide since 2008 according to the “Wall Street
Wrecking Ball”, a report prepared by Alliance of Californians for
Community Empowerment (ACCE) and California Reinvestment Coalition.



The settlement numbers are not the only numbers that do not add up for
the Occupy Activists.



“Wells Fargo has $1.3 trillion in assets, they made a record $15.87
billion in profit for 2011,” said Thottam, “The settlement money is
chump change to them. And these banks need to be held responsible for
the economic crisis.”



In attendance for Wells Fargo was Joe Ohayon, Senior Vice President of
Community and Client Relations; John Sotoodeh, Southern California
Regional President, who made the initial contact with Occupy the Rose
Parade and acted as a contact point person during the preparations
leading up to Monday’s meetings.



In addition to Mr. Sotoodeh, also in attendance for Wells Fargo were
Diana Rodriguez, Vice President of Communications; Drew Collins,
Senior Vice President and Sales Manager for mortgages in California;
Alfredo Pedroza, Director of California Local Government Relations;
and Jonathan Weedman, the Head of Wells Fargo Foundation.



Wells Fargo invited Regina Birdsell from the Center for Nonprofit
Management to moderate the discussion and Cooke Sunoo, who sits on
Wells Fargo’s Los Angeles Community Advisor Board and is an Asian
Pacific Islander Small Business Program Director.



Also in attendance were Pete Thottam, an Organizer for Occupy the Rose
Parade and Occupy LA member.  Thottam is also a Real Estate Lawyer and
has run for State Assembly. Carlos Marroquin, a homeowner advocate and
Occupy LA member; Kwazi Nkruma, co-founder of Occupy the Hood LA and
community organizer; Mark Lipman, a member of Occupy LA, organizer of
Occupy the Rose Parade, and a poet who has previously run for State
Assembly too; and Cheryl Aichele, a member of Occupy LA working on the
foreclosure crisis.


Also invited by the Occupy members were Ellen Hodgson Brown, author
and lawyer, and Marcy Winograd, an anti-war activist and former
Congressional candidate.  Both Brown and Winograd have spoken at
Occupy LA and Occupy the Rose Parade events as well.

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