St. Paul "To Turn The Screws On Lenders" For Blight Caused By Vacant Foreclosures

In St. Paul, Minnesota, the Pioneer Press reports:

• The city of St. Paul, grappling with a growing list of abandoned buildings now 1,700 homes long, is taking a swing at national lenders in a stepped-up effort to tackle the foreclosure crisis. A highlight of the city's game plan, announced Wednesday, is hiring a lawyer from the St. Paul-based Foreclosure Relief Law Project to advise on legal strategies to turn the screws on lenders such as Wells Fargo & Co., U.S. Bancorp and Deutsche Bank AG. The city said a small group of large lenders is responsible for many of the abandoned properties St. Paul is struggling with, neglecting the buildings and leaving them to deteriorate. "We want to be clear: If they don't come to the table, we're going to go after them," St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman told reporters.

***

• St. Paul appears to be borrowing a page from the foreclosure playbook used by the cities of Cleveland and Buffalo, N.Y. Those cities have sued major lenders and servicers in recent months, accusing them of failing to take care of properties after foreclosure.

For more, see St. Paul goes after national lenders in effort to battle foreclosure blight.

See also:

• Minneapolis Star Tribune: St. Paul looks hard at fallout of foreclosure (The city announced strategies to get owners of foreclosed and vacant properties to take responsibility for them),
• KARE-TV Channel 11: St. Paul to get tough with lenders in foreclosure crisis (According to police, many vacant homes have been the target of arsonists. Thieves have been known to break in and take out copper piping and appliances. Vandals have broken in and used them as sites for parties where the home is left trashed and full of graffiti),
• Minnesota Public Radio: St. Paul threatens legal action against banks that own vacant houses.

Go here for posts on the approach taken by the City of Buffalo, NY towards foreclosing lenders and its vacant houses.

To view Buffalo's lawsuit against a host of lenders on account of the blight caused by the abandoned houses in foreclosure, see City of Buffalo v. ABN Amro Mortgage Group Inc., et al. (3.67 MB; available online courtesy of the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP). If there's a problem with this link, email me at HomeEquityTheft@yahoo.com and I'll email it to you (please put "City of Buffalo v. ABN Amro" in the subject line).

Go here for posts on Cleveland's lawsuit against 21 investment banks involving neighborhoods blighted by vacant foreclosures.

Go here and go here for other posts on vacant homes leaving its mark on neighborhoods. neighborhood destruction from foreclosures zach