Moonhowlings

From the New York Times, Sunday, March 15, 2009

Then there is Hylton High School’s home county, Prince William. What was once a mostly white, middle-class suburb 35 miles southwest of the nation’s capital has been transformed by a construction boom into a traffic-choked sprawl of townhouses and strip malls where Latinos are the fastest-growing group.

Neighborhood disputes led the county to enact laws intended to drive illegal immigrants away. White and black families with the means to buy their way out of the turmoil escaped to more affluent areas. Hispanic families, feeling threatened or just plain unwelcome, were torn between those who had legal status and those who did not. Many fled.

By last March, educators reported that at least 759 immigrant students had dropped out of county schools. Hylton, whose 2,200 student population is almost equal parts white, black and Latino and comes from working-class apartment complexes and upscale housing developments, was one of the hardest hit.

The New York Times is a large, well-funded newspaper that has national stature. Is the above excerpt from the article how things really happened here in Prince William County? Is this how our county looked to those outside the region? Is this how we want to be perceived?

Would you want to relocate in Prince William County after this description? If you were a business, would you want to move here?

At what point does it really matter what really happened? Has perception become reality?

Apparently Businessweek has even heard of Prince William County’s dirty little secret. In a March 6 article entitled, “ Signs of Life from the Real Estate Market,” Prince William County is highlighted as being abuzz with real estate buyers. That was the good news. Read on hear the bad news:

Across the country in Prince William County, Va., outside Washington D.C., buyers are out in force. The market, where subprime loans and boom-time construction were rampant, was badly damaged in the downturn. Making matters worse, a controversial law in Prince William County that allowed police officers to enforce immigration laws helped drive out many of the Central American immigrants who came in to work on building the new homes during the boom. Many of those immigrants who moved to neighboring Fairfax County allowed their Prince William County homes to go into foreclosure, said John McClain, senior fellow at George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis.

Proximity to D.C. Helps
The good news now is that inventories of unsold homes are shrinking because of the accelerating sales, though homeowners who could afford to have also likely taken their properties off the market, McClain said. In January, 3,346 homes were on the market compared to 5,355 in January, 2007, McClain said. In January, 647 homes sold in Prince William County compared to 312 a year earlier. Home prices, however, fell 34%.

One factor that could help Prince William County toward recovery is its proximity to Washington D.C., one of the few local economies with relatively good prospects thanks to its federal government and defense contractor jobs. Woodbridge, Va., in Prince William County, came in at No. 14 in our ranking. Woodbridge sales jumped 32% in the fourth quarter while median home prices dropped 18% to $215,500, according to First American CoreLogic.

The drop in inventory and the rise in sales are “good signs” for Prince William County, McClain said.
“We are at that point with that trend [in Prince William County] where the economics have to kick in,” McClain said. “Prices have to stabilize and then start up again.”
Erick Blackwelder, associate broker with Exit Realty in Woodbridge, said buyers have flocked to the market and have already bought many of the foreclosed homes that were in good shape. The remaining foreclosures are largely “junk,” he said.

“It started in April 2008,” Blackwelder said. “It was like all of a sudden, somebody flicked on a light switch and there were buyers galore.”

How many people would find Prince William County an attractive place to relocate after reading an article like this one? “To make matters worse….” seems to say it all.

Full Story

In 2007, Prince William County Supervisors passed the “Immigration Resolution” which stated in part that “illegal immigration has been determined to cause economic hardship and lawlessness.” Has our outcome supported the assertion that ‘more illegals cause more crime and worse economic conditions’ with the converse being ‘less illegals therefore less crime and a better economy’?

According to the Prince William County Crime Report for 2008, crime now, one year after the resolution’s passage crime is slightly increased. This effectively ends our 5 year decreasing crime rate trend which obviously must have existed during our “influx of illegals.”

In financial terms, can we state that our economic hardships have lessened since the introduction of the resolution? Prince William County now leads the state and ranks top in the nation in foreclosures, and our home values have dropped 32%. The neighborhood issues that existed prior to the passage of the resolution are resurfacing as foreclosed homes bought by real estate investors are turned into rental properties. And our County budget is facing deep cuts this year with an equally dismal prospect for next.

Many predicted dire consequences but Supervisors refused to heed their warnings. Probably nobody said it better than Oklahoma Republican State Representative Shane Jett, who opposed similar legislation in his state, when he stated:

“[the passage of these types of legislations] will be the single most destructive economic disaster since the Dust Bowl,”

Now with almost one full year of crime figures, foreclosure numbers, home values, and tax revenue numbers compiled can we definitively state that the assertions in the resolution were completely unfounded?  Strictly speaking, we had lower crime rates and a better economy when the ‘illegals’ were here.  Will the status quo remain, as Stewart continues to assert that the resolution is working well?

Obviously this issue has been the single most divisive issue to happen here.  Will Supervisors heed Dr. Fuller’s advice, and change course?  Or, are they content with allowing Chairman Stewart to continue down this path hoping that voters will only hold him responsible?

Yesterday Corey Stewart, along with Brooking Institute senior fellow Audrey Singer, were guests on the WAMU Kojo Nnamdi Show.

Some people have suggested that Corey Stewart is weakening on the Immigration Resolution.  According to the News and Messenger, Stewarts says no, he isn’t.

Prince William Chairman Corey A. Stewart, R-at large, said the county’s illegal immigration resolution is here to stay even in these hard economic times.

“We think it’s working and we’re going to keep it,” Stewart said in an interview Wednesday on the Kojo Nnamdi Show on WAMU, a National Public Radio affiliate.

Nnamdi asked Stewart if his focus hadn’t wavered recently in light of record foreclosures in Prince William County resulting from the failing economy.

Stewart told Nnamdi that he thought people in the community were satisfied with things as they stand, and the board wouldn’t abandon the resolution that first came under discussion in July 2007. The resolution was finally implemented in July 2008 and required police to ask anyone they stopped about their immigration status.

“Those in the community seem to be content with it, even those who opposed the policy initially,” Stewart said.

Still other things demand the board’s attention, Stewart said.

“We’re trying to move on to other problems and other concerns, namely the economy,” Stewart said. “People are worried about their jobs and their homes and everything else.

“We’ve got a lot of financial problems in the county just like a lot of other counties. We’ve had to cut about 20 percent of our budget,” Stewart said.

It sounds like Corey wants it both ways. He doesn’t want to leave the anti-immigration pack but also doesn’t want to linger. Is he now trumpeting the ‘time to move on’ theme?

[UPDATE:  Here is the link Leila left for us to listen to the interview with Stewart and Singer]

http://wamu.org/programs/kn/09/02/25.php#25253  

According to this chart from the George Mason Regional Analysis Center, Prince William County Foreclosure Rates are OFF THE CHART in comparison to surrounding jurisdictions. WTOP news is reporting Prince William property values have dropped more than double of Fairfax County and slightly more than double of Loudoun County.
Read more…

The latest item on the Prince William County Schools chopping block is the sports program.  Despicable.  This absolutely should not be allowed to happen.  There needs to be a firestorm of protest; otherwise I’m afraid it will be cut.

There’s a petition to sign at – http://petitionspot.com/petitions/saveMSsports

and a BLOG at – http://savemiddleschoolsports.wardcentral.com/

And, I’d strongly encourage parents to attend the School Board Meeting on Wednesday night to voice your opposition in person. 

More than 150 Prince William County employees had a lucky day on Tuesday. The county received 323 applications for 167 spots in the Home Help Program. Through this program, the county seeks to cut the number of vacant houses in the county by providing low interest loans and reduced mortgage rates to entry level county employees. These employees will become home owners in Prince William County in the very near future, which is seen as a desirable goal.

According to the DC Examiner:

The plan helps fulfill a long-time county goal to have more public employees living in the county. Martino [county finance director] hopes the program will help Prince William recruit and retain employees, many of whom live outside the county and face long commutes.

The county invested $50 million in certificates of deposit at SunTrust Bank to fund the first year of Home Help. County officials emphasized that the money comes from an investment portfolio and does not use taxpayer money.

Read more…

About 500 chickens remain in Loudoun County custody as part of a cockfighting crackdown in Lovettsville, VA. Even though the chickens which are mostly roosters will remain on the farm, they are considered evidence in an ongoing investigation.

Charges have not yet been brought but 2 farms are involved. Much cockfighting paraphernalia has been seized. The cockfighting laws have tightened up since the Michael Vick dog fighting scandal broke. The commonwealth’s attorney has not yet decided if he will press charges. If he does, this will be the first test case under the new anti-cockfighting laws.

It is interesting that this little indiscretion happened in Loudoun County. I guess the muckety mucks aren’t quite as muckety muck as they once thought.

Before I start crowing too much though, fancy roosters with spurs on have been seen running loose in Westgate subdivision. Perhaps Prince William County has a similar problem. The News and Messenger had better be ready to break this big story. Has anyone out there seen any odd animals that could be used in illegal animal fighting? Besides animal cruelty, illegal gambling is generally at the heart of some of the cockfights as well as dog fights. These aren’t your ordinary barnyard roosters.

Real Estate is booming in Prince William County. This is a good news/bad news situation. While houses are selling at dirt cheap prices, these sales are helping to set the assessment rate and therefore, the amount of money brought in by the county. The sales are also helping lock in our home value. Anyone who needs to sell their home in the near future is going to be giving away their house.

Another down side of the real estate boom in PWC is that investors are gobbling up properties. Some of our neighborhoods are about 15% rental. The county is considering a rental inspection program down the road. Currently, in order to do that, an area must be declared a blighted area. Very few homeowners would like their neighborhood declared a blighted area.

Neighborhoods that have too many rental units are often plagued with problems from home upkeep to overcrowding. Absentee landlordism has been responsible for the downfall of many local communities as owners moved onward and upward and kept their properties. Other folks sold out to investors. Several examples of rental properties gone bad can be seen in the county and in the city.

Cheaper isn’t always better. Homeowners will have to be vigilant to maintain their neighborhoods if a disproportionate number of homes become rental units. Ideally, the investors will be members of the community. Then there is a real interest in who rents your house.

Hopefully, the upturn in the real estate market is a sign of recovery and that soon good news will emerge.

For those unfamiliar with Chris Royse, he ran an unsuccessful campaign against Frank Principi for the vacated Woodbridge Supervisor seat during the 2007 election. (This video shows him addressing the BOCS on 7-10-07). In this letter to the editor he perhaps purposely misrepresents Principi’s pro-life stance. One needs to ask themselves Royse’s motivation for doing so. Presumably he wants to keep his name in the public domain because he anticipates another candidacy for public office. In short, a blatant attack on elected officials masked as a ‘christian’ holiday greeting is in extremely poor taste and should be remembered as such for a long time to come.

Here’s the letter:

This time of year is special to Christians as Christmas is the celebration of the birth of our savior Jesus Christ.

Birth and life are very important concepts to Christians, and in particular Catholics.

We are commanded by the Pope to love and protect the unborn since God sent his only son to be born, raised and crucified among us.

This year, shortly after Christmas, we will inaugurate President-elect Obama who has publicly referred to pregnancy as “punishment,” and we will see his local followers, Congressman-elect Gerry
Connolly and Woodbridge Supervisor Frank Principi — both Catholics who support pro-choice agendas in direct violation of the Church’s teachings — continue on their path of supporting the destruction of
human life.

This holiday season, a season which includes the celebration of birth, I request that leaders throughout the Arlington Diocese call on Connolly and Principi to stop their hypocrisy and to consider denying them communion until they realign themselves with the teachings of our church.

As Jesus taught us in Matthew 23:12 “and whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted,” Christmas is the perfect time for the humble unborn to be exalted and
those local “leaders” who exalt themselves by publicly defying their own faith to be humbled.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year.

CHRIS ROYSE
Woodbridge

 The News and Messenger is reporting tough times in PWC this morning as County Executive Craig Gerhart tries to figure out ways to preserve jobs and meet county budget all at the same time. Some of the options county employees face are working a day without pay, cutting back on holidays or facing a general salary cut or being sent home and taking a day off without pay. None of the options are pleasant to face.

 In his presentation to the BOCS yesterday, Gerhart outlined ways to retain current county personnel and meet the budget constraints. Even with an increased tax rate of $1.13, up from $.98 homeowners are expected to pay less in taxes because of decreased home values. Less in taxes translates into more budget shortfall. PWC has been the hardest hit jurisdiction in the area with foreclosures.

 Neabsco Supervisor John Jenkins asked about the feasibility of freezing salaries of the higher paid county employees. That too will be examined. It appears that public safety departments are the only places there will not be drastic budget reductions.

 Things certainly have a different look than say a year ago, when we had citizens directing the county to raise their taxes to enforce the Immigration Resolution. But, in the words of that immortal wise sage Bob Dylan, we were so much older then…….

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUo0nam_QwQ

 Lyrics:

http://www.bobdylan.com/#/songs/my-back-pages

Recently, a tragic story, has come to epitomize the need to find common ground and solutions for comprehensive immigration reform. There has been talk on AntiBVBL, round and round, about what constitutes hate, how racism is defined, and how words contribute to hate and a growing sense of anger and resentment toward Latinos as an immigrant population. This editorial from the New York Times sheds some light on a community, enveloped by fear and anger until the final culmination, an innocent man’s death, requires us all to acknowledge the truth.  There is a dangerous outcome that lurks beneath the surface of misleading people believe that Hispanics are somehow deserving of punishment.

I am sad to say the description below of Suffolk County executive Steve Levy reminds me of our own Corey Stewart and his rhetoric — rhetoric I urged him numerous times to alter, and bring some healing to our community. He ignored me, as he ignored many others during the most volatile times in Prince William County.

Words have consequences. Steve Levy, the Suffolk County executive, is learning that the hard way during a horrible week. Seven teenagers were arrested and charged in the fatal stabbing last Saturday of Marcello Lucero, an Ecuadorean immigrant, on a street in the Long Island village of Patchogue.

Mr. Levy’s past harsh words and actions against undocumented workers have now left him cornered with a tragically limited ability to lead the county in confronting a brutal act that surely pains him as much as anyone.

Local lawmakers often complain about immigration, but Mr. Levy went much farther than most. He founded a national organization to lobby for crackdowns. He went on “Lou Dobbs.” He tried to deputize county police to make immigration arrests and to rid the county work force of employees without papers. He sought to drive day laborers from local streets, yet rigidly opposed efforts to create hiring sites. Even as tensions simmered in places like Farmingville, a hot spot for anti-immigrant resentment, Mr. Levy would not budge.

He parroted extremist talking points, going so far as to raise the alarm, utterly false, that illegal immigrants’ “anchor babies” were forcing Southampton Hospital to close its maternity ward. He denounces racist hatred, yet his words have made him a hero in pockets of Long Island where veins of racism run deep.

All that came back to haunt Mr. Levy this week, when an evil act underscored the need to draw together. Immigrant advocates assailed him for having poisoned the atmosphere. Some called for his resignation. With tactless self-pity, Mr. Levy complained to Newsday that the killing would have been a one-day story anywhere but his home turf. He laments that people overlook his recent, far more measured tone on the issue. He insists that people have a distorted picture of him. Mr. Levy needs to realize that distortions cut both ways.

The BOCS Halloween Financial Retreat begins today. Instead of going to some swanky place to convene, to their credit, the PWC BOCS are staying put and doing their work right at County Complex.

Their task is daunting. Running a county on a $190 million dollar shortfall is not for the faint of heart nor for one with a personal agenda. Pre-released agenda documents pretty much spelled out how dire the situation is.

At root of the financial problem is the huge, disproportionate amount of foreclosures in PWC. Each foreclosure lowers the property values of the houses around it. Many people have seen an almost 50% drop in the value of their home in the past 2 years.

The loss of value of the homes naturally changes the property tax assessments. As if things weren’t bad enough, sales tax receipts have dropped for 5 months in a row. The county is hurting.

Each county department was directed to create a budget with 10%, 20%, and 30% cuts. Looking through the documents, there were some extremely severe cuts. All eyes will be on the public safety departments first.

According to the Washington Post:

Read more…

Prince William County Supervisors need to account for this phenomenon. What is the difference between the Counties? What accounts for this horrific occurrence of foreclosures which will most likely have lingering effects for a decade? Plain and simple, it’s the immigration resolution. The sooner Supervisors recognize this fact the faster we could turn this thing around. They have the power to stop the hemorrhaging but will they act on it? Do they prefer to see property values decline, real estate assessments plummet and the County’s budget completely destroyed? Perhaps so.

In my opinion, a more prudent course of action would be to not give anybody further reason to abandon a home. There’s never been a complete cost benefit analysis and it’s becoming pretty evident that any perceived savings from drops in ESoL enrollment have been more than off-set by devastating losses in our residential real estate market. These losses are causing extreme economic hardship among home owners who planned to use their home equity to finance their kid’s education, retirement or financing for business operations. Eventually, we will hit rock bottom but at what cost?