Badlands Journal

Westamerica Bank, San Rafael, California, Acquires All the Deposits of County Bank, Merced, California

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 6, 2009  Media Contact:
David Barr (202) 898-6992
Cell: (703) 622-4790
E-mail: dbarr@fdic.gov 

County Bank, Merced, California, was closed today by the California Department of Financial Institutions, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with Westamerica Bank, San Rafael, California, to assume all of the deposits of County Bank.

County Bank's 39 offices will reopen as branches of Westamerica Bank. County Bank branches that had Saturday hours will reopen tomorrow. County Bank's remaining branches will reopen on Monday. Depositors of County Bank will automatically become depositors of Westamerica Bank. Deposits will continue to be insured by the FDIC, so there is no need for customers to change their banking relationship to retain their deposit insurance coverage. Customers of both banks should continue to use their existing branches until Westamerica Bank can fully integrate the deposit records of County Bank.

Over the weekend, depositors of County Bank can access their money by writing checks or using ATM or debit cards. Checks drawn on the bank will continue to be processed. Loan customers should continue to make their payments as usual.

Panel will debate controversial water issues Feb. 4 at Fresno State

(January 14, 2009) – A public debate on water policy in California and the Central Valley will be moderated by U.S District Judge Oliver Wanger at 7 p.m. Feb. 4, at California State University, Fresno. Agricultural and environmental advocates will face off on the issues.

The debate, which is free and open to the public, will be held in the Satellite Student Union (2485 E. San Ramon Ave. at Maple Avenue, south of Barstow Avenue). It is sponsored by Fresno State’s Political Science Student Association and the Political Science Department.

As the presiding judge for the Eastern District of California, Wanger has ruled over most of the major water cases recently in the Valley, including the controversy over preserving Delta smelt in the Sacramento Delta. Wanger will provide brief opening remarks, said Dr. Thomas Holyoke, a political science professor who is coordinating the event.

Badlands Journal, in its remorseless efforts to understand Merced County, has embarked on a series of comparative economic studies. In fact, in the hope of boosting sagging UC Merced enrollment, Badlands plans to endow a chair in comparative econometric modeling, complete with oodles of math and whirring computers, just as soon as it is solvent. Or is it liquid?

Imagine, the government of a nation with only 50,000 more people than Merced County is being held responsible for that nation's economic collapse!

At first glance, there does not seem to be much basis for comparison between Iceland and Merced County, but as all real good economists know, the poetry is in the numbers.

The population is basically the same and so is the economic condition -- disastrous.

Yet, Iceland has only 0.07-percent arable land and fishing is the basic industry. There are more whalers than farmers in Iceland, while the reverse is true in Merced County. 

But, there is also extensive mining in Iceland, which offers some comparison with Merced County's endless stream of sand and gravel mines.

Iceland had begun to diversify into manufacturing and computer-related industries, the old high-tech, bio-tech engine of growth that UC Merced was supposed to instantly provide Merced County except that all the "money" (credit) was in real estate.

Iceland's now-collapsed banks got into international high finance, another point of comparison with Merced County, where no one quite knows who owns what slice of whose mortgage.

At first, when we received a press release from Rep. Dennis Cardoza, Shrimp Slayer-Maryland, about reducing mortgage payments and, in general, solving the entire recession/depression, we were impressed and willing to applaud the effort. Later, we read the bill, or, more correctly, we tried without success to read and understand the bill, H.R. 230. Our failure derives no doubt from our residence in Merced, in the 18th congressional district of California, rather than in Annapolis, in the 3rd congressional district of Maryland. Although last night we spied a UC Merced student in a supermarket line with a T-shirt announcing, "I know something you don't know...UC Merced 2006-2007," we didn't think the video buyer would be able to help us understand Cardoza's bill, so we didn't ask him what he thought this section might have meant:

(e) Securitization-

(1) REQUIREMENT- Each enterprise shall, upon such terms and conditions as it may prescribe, set aside any qualified mortgages purchased by it under this section and, upon approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, issue and sell securities based upon such mortgages set aside.

(2) FORM- Securities issued under this subsection may be in the form of debt obligations or trust certificates of beneficial interest, or both.

(3) TERMS- Securities issued under this subsection shall have such maturities and bear such rate or rates of interest as may be determined by the enterprise with the approval of the Secretary.

1-6-09
Modesto Bee
Lowering UC's standards has several costs...Doug Ose. Ose, of Granite Bay, is a developer who served three terms in Congress.
http://www.modbee.com/opinion/community/v-print/story/553747.html
Editor's note: This article was submitted in response to The Bee's editorial "Changes in UC admissions should improve process" (Jan. 2, Page A-1).
Recently the University of California Board of Regents considered a proposal to lower admission standards for incoming freshman. At the heart of the proposal is the elimination of the SAT subject tests and the establishment of a "holistic" admissions process called Entitled to Review.
The concern is that eliminating subject tests removes a long- established path to admissions that has a proven record in predicting a student's readiness for success in college. Changing to this new policy invites legal mischief. UCLA has been using "holistic" admissions practices and now faces scrutiny for potential violations of Proposition 209, which outlawed college admissions based on race or ethnicity. Fortunately, a significant public outcry from students and others forced the regents to postpone making any decision until early 2009.

12-22-08
Merced Sun-Star editorial

...How can we judge if California is taking more water from the delta and its watershed than they can handle?
Consider the evidence: Smelt are at the brink of extinction. Other species, such as salmon, are in serious peril. Federal courts are using the hammer of the Endangered Species Act to deliver a blunt message about the entire ecosystem.
Dry years, when cities and farms suck more from the delta than they do during more rainy times, are especially tough for these species. During wet years, 87 percent of the water entering the delta makes it out to the San Francisco Bay. During dry years, the figure drops to 51 percent.
If California is to have any hope of restoring the delta and avoiding clashes with federal judges, it must develop a water plan that reduces its dependence on this estuary and strives for greater reliability.
What would this plan look like?
To begin with, it must be grounded in reality. Water contracts based on dated premises must be renegotiated, and efficiency should be the law of the land.
Each region of the state -- including Sacramento and the San Joaquin Valley -- must find ways to reduce what it takes from the delta and its watershed. And environmental groups must recognize that not every species will be restored to its population predating the Gold Rush...

“The Bush Administration is seeking to gut the Endangered Species Act on its way out the door,” Attorney General Brown said.

News Release
December 30, 2008
For Immediate Release
Contact: Christine Gasparac 916-324-5500

http://www.ag.ca.gov/newsalerts/release.php?id=1644&

Attorney General Brown Sues to Overturn Bush Administration Rules Undermining Endangered Species Act

SAN FRANCISCO– California Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. has filed suit in federal court to block an “audacious attempt” by the Bush Administration to gut provisions in the Endangered Species Act mandating scientific review of federal agency decisions that may threaten endangered species and their habitat.

 “This is an audacious attempt to circumvent a time-tested statute that for 35 years has required scientific review of proposed federal agency decisions that affect wildlife.”

The new regulations, initially proposed by the Departments of the Interior and Commerce in August 2008 and made final on December 16, largely eliminate a requirement in the Endangered Species Act that mandates scientific review of federal agency decisions that might affect endangered and threatened species and their habitats.

For information:
Carolee Krieger, Executive Director and Board President, California Water Impact Network, (805) 969-0824,
caroleeekrieger@cox.net
Bill Jennings, Chairman, California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, (209) 464-5067, (209) 938-9053 (cell),
deltakeep@aol.com
Michael Jackson, Counsel, California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, and Board Member, California Water
Impact Network, (530) 283-0712, mjatty@sbcglobal.net
For a copy of the complaint filed in Sacramento Superior Court, see www.c-win.org or www.calsport.org.

Calling it “the biggest lawsuit about the biggest ecological and legal catastrophe in California today,” the California Water Impact Network (C-WIN) and the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance (CSPA) filed suit in Sacramento Superior Court Friday, November 28, 2008, to protect Delta public trust resources—including endangered migratory fisheries of salmon and open water fish species—and to end wasteful and unreasonable diversions of water from the Delta by big state and federal water projects.

The suit also asks the court to halt irrigation of several hundred thousand acres of selenium contaminated lands on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley, the drainage from which pollutes wetlands, the San Joaquin River, and the Delta.

Where are all the doomsayers of 2006? Those people, who said the speculative real estate boom could not last, were a kind of answer.

Their argument necessarily called for a governmental solution, a need for immediate, perhaps even drastic regulation of a bubble gone wild and spreading, via securitized debt, throughout the world. By 2007, the doomsayers were even saying that this could result in a global credit freeze. These days, they content themselves with documenting the damage.

Government didn't listen; it continued to enable the bubble. Today, the lame duck Bush administration is desperately trying to restore credibility to securitized credit debt at unbelievable, unimaginable but inadequate public expense, as wave upon wave of defaults, we are told, are yet to come -- more residential mortgage defaults, commercial mortgage defaults, credit card defaults. The ever-cheery mainstream press is beginning to scrape the bottom of the barrel to find credentialled prophets willing to predict even a mid-term reversal of economic bad news.

Obama promised Change! but we doubt he'd like to take any credit for the real changes happening.

The articles below from the Merced Sun-Star tell a story about felony indictments brought against five people associated with Firm Build, a program started in 1998 to train "troubled teens" in construction trades. Merced County Planning Commissioner Rudy Buendia was or is still executive director of Firm Build, which went bankrupt months ago.

Buendia, charged originally with 15 felonies (later 17), according to the newspaper fled arrest and was a "fugitive" for two days before turning himself in with Kirk McAllister, Modesto criminal defense attorney, at his side.

Two of the five charged were arrested. It is unclear from reports if two others were arrested or turned themselves in. Two have posted bail and been released.

Buendia, the only reported fugitive, was released without paying bail on September 18 by Superior Court Judge McCabe. The judge's reasons included Buendia's clean record and that he personally knew seven of the 20 prominent people who wrote letters on Buendia's behalf. The board of supervisors is reported to have no plans of removing either Planning Commissioner Buendia or Patrick Bowman, on the board of the "troubled" Merced County Housing Authority and an official of the Merced County Office of Education, from the positions the board appointed them to.