We walked back to our friends’ house and walked home about an hour or so later. We didn’t really notice any sort of smell or smoke in the neighborhood. Ten minutes later, though, when we left the house to walk the dogs — oh, my. It was bad. Scary, unnerving bad. Cover your face with any sort of mask at hand bad. It’s still like that out there.

WASHINGTON — Law enforcement tracking of cellphones, once the province mainly of federal agents, has become a powerful and widely used surveillance tool for local police officials, with hundreds of departments, large and small, often using it aggressively with little or no court oversight, documents show….

Many departments try to keep cell tracking secret, the documents show, because of possible backlash from the public and legal problems. Although there is no evidence that the police have listened to phone calls without warrants, some defense lawyers have challenged other kinds of evidence gained through warrantless cell tracking.

“Do not mention to the public or the media the use of cellphone technology or equipment used to locate the targeted subject,” the Iowa City Police Department warned officers in one training manual. It should also be kept out of police reports, it advised.

For all the Augustus Gloops in the world, this article is not for you. But for those who eat little bits of chocolate every day in moderation, there is news to celebrate. A new study from the University of California (UC) San Diego has found that adults who regularly eat chocolate are thinner than those who don’t. However, one must make the distinction between bits of chocolate and munching on candy bars all day. High consumption of chocolate-rich foods (i.e. cake, cookies, chocolate bars) will inevitably lead to obesity and related health effects. Dark chocolate was found to be the best.

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 Today Facebook, Twitter and text messaging allow teenagers and 20-somethings to connect without wheels. High gas prices and environmental concerns don’t help matters.

“They think of a car as a giant bummer,” said Mr. Martin. “Think about your dashboard. It’s filled with nothing but bad news.”

There is data to support Mr. Martin’s observations. In 2008, 46.3 percent of potential drivers 19 years old and younger had drivers’ licenses, compared with 64.4 percent in 1998, according to the Federal Highway Administration, and drivers ages 21 to 30 drove 12 percent fewer miles in 2009 than they did in 1995.

Forty-six percent of drivers aged 18 to 24 said they would choose Internet access over owning a car, according to the research firm Gartner.

Sponsors

ALD. COGGS, HINES, HAMILTON, WITKOWSKI, DAVIS, WADE

Title

Substitute resolution urging Governor Scott Walker and Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen to use the foreclosure settlement funding for programs directly related to foreclosure issues.

Analysis

As a result of a tentative $25 billion settlement between the federal government, 49 states and the District of Columbia, and the nation’s five largest mortgage servicers, Wisconsin is projected to receive an estimated $141 million intended to provide direct relief for affected homeowners, refinancing benefits for eligible borrowers, and remediation programs and services. Rather than use all the funds for programs directly related to foreclosure issues, Governor Scott Walker and Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen announced their intent to direct $25.6 million to help balance the state budget. The six zip code areas in the state which have been most affected by the foreclosure crisis are in the city of Milwaukee. This resolution urges the Attorney General and the Governor to use the foreclosure settlement monies for funding programs directly related to foreclosure issues in the most affected areas of the state.

Body

Whereas, The federal government and 49 state attorneys general reached a $25 billion settlement agreement with the five largest mortgage servicers to address mortgage loan servicing and foreclosure abuses; and

Whereas, The joint agreement is the largest federal-state civil settlement ever obtained and is the result of extensive investigations by federal agencies, including the Department of Justice, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the HUD Office of the Inspector General, and state attorneys general and state banking regulators across the country; and

Whereas, The partnership between the states and the federal agencies made it possible to achieve favorable terms and conditions that would have been difficult for the states or the federal government to achieve on their own; and

Whereas, The agreement requires servicers to implement comprehensive new mortgage loan servicing standards and to commit $25 billion to resolve violations of state and federal law, including servicers’ use of “robo-signed” affidavits in foreclosure proceedings, deceptive practices in the offering of loan modifications, failures to offer non-foreclosure alternatives before foreclosing on borrowers with federally insured mortgages and filing improper documentation in federal bankruptcy court; and

Whereas, The servicers are required to collectively dedicate $20 billion toward various forms of financial relief to borrowers, with $10 billion for reducing the principal on loans for borrowers who are either delinquent or at imminent risk of default and owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth, $3 billion for refinancing loans for borrowers who are current on their mortgages but who owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth, and $7 billion for other forms of relief, including forbearance of principal for unemployed borrowers, anti-blight programs, short sales and transitional assistance, benefits for service members who are forced to sell their homes at a loss as a result of a Permanent Change in Station order, and other programs; and

Whereas, In addition to the $20 billion in financial relief for borrowers, the agreement requires the servicers to pay $5 billion in cash to the federal and state governments to be used to fund housing counselors, legal aid and other public programs aimed to remediate the damages caused by the practices of the lenders; and

Whereas, The state will receive a $141 million from the banks to help cities and people affected by the foreclosure crisis; and

Whereas, Of the $141 million received by the state, Wisconsin Attorney General J.P. Van Hollen has sole authority to determine the use of $31.6 million, and of that $31.6 million, the governor and attorney general are proposing to use $25.6 million as a one-time budget fix; and

Whereas, Between 2008 and 2010, almost 16,000 Milwaukee property owners defaulted on their mortgage payments, and another 6,000 homes in the city are in the foreclosure process; and

Whereas, The illegal practices of the lenders in this settlement have led to a large increase in abandoned buildings in the city, resulting in increased calls for police services, higher incidence of fires, both accidental and intentional, and decline and disinvestment in neighborhoods; and

Whereas, The city has approximately 4,800 vacant and abandoned properties that would cost about $48 million to tear down or stabilize; and

Whereas, The monies received by the state could be utilized to stabilize some of the abandoned properties, saving housing stock in the hardest-hit areas and reducing the negative effect of the abandoned buildings; and

Whereas, The six zip code areas in the state which have been most affected by the foreclosure crisis are in the city of Milwaukee; now, therefore, be it

Resolved, By the Common Council of the City of Milwaukee, that the Common Council urges Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen and Governor Scott Walker to use the foreclosure settlement funding for its intended purposes of remediating the effects of the foreclosure crisis in the areas affected most; and, be it

Further Resolved, That the City Clerk shall send copies of this resolution to Governor Scott Walker and Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen.

U.S. crude oil imports during 2011 fell to their lowest level in twelve years and were down 12% from their peak in 2005, as higher domestic oil production and decreased consumption of petroleum products reduced American refiners’ purchases of foreign crude.

U.S. crude oil imports averaged 8.9 million barrels per day (bbl/d) in 2011, down 3.2% (0.3 million bbl/d) from the year before. Imports of crude oil fell below 9 million bbl/d for the first time since 1999, according to full-year trade data in EIA’s February Petroleum Supply Monthly. Since reaching a peak of 10.1 million bbl/d in 2005, oil imports are down 12%, or 1.2 million bbl/d.

Purchases of imported crude oil have declined because U.S. refiners had more supplies from domestic crude production to use, particularly higher oil output from Texas and North Dakota’s Bakken formation. Texas oil production last year reached its highest level since 1997, and North Dakota appears to have pushed past California in December as the third biggest oil producing state.

The State Integrity Investigation, a partnership between the Center for Public Integrity, Global Integrity and Public Radio International to measure the risk of corruption in every state, released full state report cards today. They include letter grades, reporter comments and research details, as well as each state’s rank among all 50 states.

Wisconsin’s report card is here. The state got a D- in “Public Access to Information” and an F in “Redistricting.”