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street roots
May 11, 2012
BOARDED UP, fro m page 1
Duffy, has been that banks are not likely to
maintain the property and often leave them
to become neglected and blighted.
“Their attention is not focused on the
individual homes that are on their inventory,
per se,” Martin says. “They’re managing a
large portfolio of properties. The bank is far
removed from the day-to-day status of the
property.”
It does not take long for the home to
start going downhill. “You can’t leave a lawn
for a week from March to June in Oregon
and expect to have anything other than a
forest,” Martin says.
Starting two years ago, Mark Wells, the
Office of Neighborhood Involvement’s North
Portland crime prevention coordinator,
began receiving numerous complaints from
neighborhood associations and safety groups
about homes that were in disrepair and
attracting squatters and illicit activity.
Since then, dealing with empty homes
has become a big part of his job. Most of
the properties, he says, have multiple
violations of the city’s housing and building
code, including garbage and trash- littering
the lawn, hanging gutters, broken windows,
graffiti, people breaking in, etc.
“They’re long-term, chronic problems,
that cost thousands of dollars,” he says.
The most calls and communications State
Rep. Lew Frederick (D-N/NE Portland) gets
from his constituents regarding foreclosures
is about empty, foreclosed homes.
“The properties have blackberries grown
over things. They’re a drop off site for
drugs. One story (I heard) is about a
property that was being used as a
prostitution site,” Frederick says. “They
have a huge impact on the neighborhood.”
Wells says the homes can “bring in some
criminal elements...
to that n eig h b o ctaL __ » - _
th a t h a s n e v e r b e e n
P H O T O B Y K E N H A W K IN S
A shopping cart sits discarded outside o f the house in Northeast Portland left vacant fo r the past fo u r years. It was foreclosed on and sits empty
under bank ownership.
nuisances or problems caused by neglect.
“It’s private property,” Wells says.
“(Without the good neighbor agreement),
we don’t have that legal piece of paper that
gives the City of Portland and police officers
the right to be on the property.”
But as was the case
with the house on
N o r th B u ffa lo , W ells
there before.” But
and others have found
more importantly, he
that it is nearly
says, the empty
"The properties have
impossible to find
properties create a
blackberries grown over
which bank, or other
“perception” and
entity, owns the
thingSa They're a drop off
increased fear of
property. The lengthy
site lo r drugs. One story (I
crime that impacts
time period of the
people’s quality of
heard) Is about a property
foreclosure process
life, including
that was being used as a
may make it look like
whether they go for
the homeowner still
walks at night on the pro stitu tio n site/" Frederick
owns the property,
says, "They have a huge
street an empty
though they may have
home is on.
im pact on the
vacated it long ago.
The police only
The county’s property
neighborhood/"
respond, says Sgt.
records may not show
— S T A T E REP. LE W FREDERICK
John Birkinbine, an
D -N /N E P O R T L A N D
a clear, recorded
officer in north
chain of ownership.
Portland’s
Complicating the
neighborhood
issue are the
response team, when
machinations of
a possible crime is
MERS, or the
being committed.
Mortgage Electronic Registry System, Inc.,
“We have a relatively limited scope,” he
which allows banks to sell mortgages to
says. “We can address it in the short term
investors — without having to record the
and we can arrest people, or we can kick
sale with the county.
people (who are squatting) out. But there’s
Banks are able to enter MERS as the
not a lot we can do. Our legal authority is
agent for lender, which means county
limited.”
property records show MERS as the
Unless it is clear that a crime is being
mortgagee, and not the bank which actually
committed, police cannot legally enter the
owns the loan. Using MERS also allows
property. And the city’s Bureau of
banks to slice and dice mortgages, selling
Development Services also does not have
parts of a loan to various investors, which
legal authority to maintain the property —
means that a home could technically be
mow the lawns, fix broken windows or
owned by more than one entity.
gutters — without permission from the
“These properties are not just absentee
owner.
owners, but anonymous owners,” Frederick
Wells has tried to get a good neighbor
says. “The lack of recorded chain of
agreement in place with empty properties
ownership ... is at least as big of a problem
he has dealt with in North Portland. That
as neglect of the property.”
agreement — between the property owner
“The banks really try to shield
and the city - would allow ONI staff or the
themselves,” Birkinbine says. “It makes it
police to enter the property and take care of really frustrating for us.”
rederick and other legislators sponsored
a bill dubbed the “good neighbor bill”
that would have required banks and other
owners of foreclosed, empty properties to
F
p o st a d u rab le sign so m e w h e re easy to find
on the house that listed who the owner was
and a contact number.
The bill was introduced in the 2010, 2011
and 2012 legislation sessions. Facing
opposition from the Oregon Banker’s
Association, it died each session. “It began
the process of really discovering who was, in
fact, involved and in charge of these
properties ... and require true paperwork for
mortgages,” Frederick says.
Other local municipalities have resorted
to creative methods of dealing with
problems caused by empty foreclosed
properties. New York City mayor Michael
Bloomberg announced in early 2009 that
the city would use nearly $25 million dollars
to rehab and sell more than 100 foreclosed,
blighted properties. The city of Philadelphia
is currently considering a variety of
proposals to deal with over 40,000
properties - including taking control of
them, and creating a city-controlled property
management company.
Mayor Sam Adams is expected to
announce in the coming weeks a
partnership between the city and financial
institutions to better track empty properties,
and create a way for the city to easily be in
contact with property owners to keep the
property maintained.
In a perfect world, Wells says, “it would
be genuine partnership with the (city) and
large financial institutions.”
A more grassroots movement has started
in Portland. Unsettle Portland, an offshoot
of the Occupy Movement and connected to
the national Take Back the Land
organization, has begun moving into and
occupying vacant homes. Birkinbine and
others dismiss their activities as a nuisance,
and a crime.
“They don’t have any legal standing.
They’re trespassing,” he says. “Properties
are being modified to provide heat or
plumbing or cooking areas.”
Duffy and others hope Portland’s empty
homes are soon dealt with, before more
people move out of their neighborhoods,
property values decline further, and the
problems associated with the homes
becomes irreversible.
“It really is stressful,” Duffy says. “How
many hours of people’s time it has taken up,
filling out complaint reports, calling in,
trying to follow up if anything is going to get
done.”
ne brightspot looking forward was the
passage in the Oregon Legislature of
new protections for homeowners facing
foreclosure, including greater access to loan
modifications and an end to the dual-track
process that allowed banks foreclose on
homeowners even while they were in the
process of modifying their loan.
The legislation echoes a nationwide
settlement against the five largest banking
institutions that, in addition to individual
homeowner relief, netted $30 million for
Oregon’s General Fund.
Janet Byrd, executive director of Housing
Partnerships and chair of the statewide
advocacy organization The Housing Alliance,
says that money should be applied to
helping people stay in their homes and
revitalizing market. Because ultimately, she
says, the best way to end the problem of
blighted, empty homes is to have families
move into them.
I think the solution to neighborhoods
with lots of abandoned properties is to
figure out ways to get the single-family
market functioning again, so that families
can be functioning in those properties,”
Byrd says.
I would rather see energy focused on
treating people well who are still in their
homes and still have a chance at mortgage
modification and assistance. And I think all
of that will help with the problem of
abandoned homes.”
O
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