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is-solarpunk · 1 year
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Solarpunk Writing Prompts #7
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Here is the source of the podcast's transcript you can read below
Solarpunk Prompts - The Great Infrastructural Project
Hello world. I'm Tomasino.
This is Solarpunk Prompts, a series for writers where we discuss Solarpunk, a movement that imagines a world where technology is used for the good of the planet.
In this series we spend each episode exploring a single Solarpunk story prompt adding some commentary, some inspirations, and some considerations.
Most importantly, we consider how that story might help us to better envision a sustainable civilization.
If this is your first time here, I'd recommend checking out our introduction episode first, where we talk about what Solarpunk is, why you should care, and why this series came into being.
Today's prompt is: "The Great Infrastructure Project"
There is a small, rural town next to whom A Great Infrastructural Project was built. It was a dam, or a huge solar & wind power plant, or a gravitational battery, etc. Over time, the corporations and the government forgot about them and in order to avoid a catastrophe they need to work with unusual, driven activists who came from all over to help them.
This is a living reality for many small communities around the globe.
The village of Xiananshen in southern Zhejiang, China, was an idyllic, historic location which had fallen into disrepair due to depopulation from 20 years of migration. It was chosen for a program called Adaptive Reuse because of its beauty and close location to Lishui city. Local government brought in sponsors and worked with the historical heritage group to update and renovate all of the original houses regardless of condition. Space was rented out from locals. A downtown set of homes were converted to a boutique hotel. Cafes, library, exhibition hall, restaurants fed by the local farms, public parks, and more were designed and built in a cooperative mode called "historic village plus crowd innovation". Employment rates increased, as did tourism. Farms were given a steadier income, especially during the off-season. Designers competed in house renovation competitions for public prestige.
This village may not be built atop a hydro plant, but it shares the experience set forth in our prompt. This type of infrastructure maintenance and revitalization was made possible by a combination of internal and external communities working together.
In their case the goal was the restoration of their infrastructure, but that won't always be the case. Your story may be about a town's need for the safe deconstruction of infrastructure.
The World Wildlife Fund has this to say about infrastructure:
Most categories of infrastructure aren't inherently good or bad—it's all about context. The right dam in the right place can provide benefits with minimal negative impacts to the environment. But the wrong dam in the wrong place can do considerable and far-reaching damage. For infrastructure to be beneficial, planners must consider the long-term impacts, risks, and trade-offs. They must take biodiversity and climate change into account, develop a plan for long-term governance and management, and engage local communities at the earliest possible stages of planning.
It should come as no surprise that many infrastructure projects today do not achieve all these goals. Without long-term governance and management accounted for at the beginning of the project, many projects are left to age, crumble, or fall as burdens to local communities whose survival depends on them.
As stated in an article from the Earth Law Center in 2017:
Due to the high cost of maintenance and safety, many of the world’s dams get more dangerous as they age. The Mosul dam in Iraq and the Kariba dam in Zambia rank among the world’s most dangerous. Should the Mosul dam fail, it could result in the death of 500,000 people and deprive millions more of power and water. The 58 year old Kariba dam could result in 3.5 million dead, leave 40 percent of South Africa without power and cause untold damage to surrounding wildlife, plus the destruction of another nearby dam, the Cahora Bassa. https://www.earthlawcenter.org/blog-entries/2017/12/dams-climate-change-bad-news
And according to a paper published by the International Institute for Environment and Development:
Disconnecting from government energy services to develop independent energy sources, such as micro-wind or biogas can help to build resilience for vulnerable groups.
The paper has a special focus on Vietnam, where fishermen face particular challenges when the electricity goes out. Lack of refrigeration and transportation options can cause great difficulties and losses getting their products to distant markets
The country's power grid as a whole is vulnerable to disruption and failure from extreme weather and flood events. This means that vulnerable populations are dependent on a system that is prone to collapse.
In Gorakhpur, India, and in the Philippines, local committees provide an opportunity for community participation in infrastructure design. After being left out of the conversations for so long and suffering the brunt of the consequences, these communities are eager to exert some control over their lives.
So what does that look like?
Kerry Scott, a social scientist, says:
The primary purpose of infrastructure and our built environment is serving the needs of communities, delivering better social outcomes and improving the quality of people’s lives.
He later adds:
Integrating social outcomes at the start is a must if we want to leave a social legacy.
Our prompt today deals with a legacy infrastructure project, one which clearly didn't take into account the present situation. It must either be maintained or decommissioned safely. It may require conversion to some new method or function. That may require technical skills they don't have, hence the need for outside help. But do these outsiders have an understanding if this place, this environment? Do they know the needs of this community?
One of our opportunities for tension and drama may lay between the community itself and the newcomers trying to fix the project. There may also be tension between these groups and the government or corporation originally responsible for the installation. This two-way or three-way intersection of communities can be very Solarpunk, but it can also easily fall into the style of other genres if we aren't careful.
If, for instance, the corporation responsible for the project is made to seem as an antagonist and the local community must throw off their oppressor in order to self-govern, that is just another form of cyberpunk. The struggle there is about technology being used for oppression rather than about it being used to find a sustainable civilization.
Be wary of blending genres in these stories as well. The atmosphere and aesthetic of Solarpunk can easily be diluted by other genres until it's unrecognizable. A cyberpunk/Solarpunk hybrid will just look like cyberpunk.
As a writer you may want to use that style of relationship between the communities, but be wary of how you frame it. Is the community your protagonist? Are they achieving their goals through Solarpunk ideals?
There is drama inherent to the infrastructure as well. Adding a time limit on action immediately increases tension, so maybe the infrastructure project has an imminent failure coming. The outsiders and the community must work together to save it from disaster even though they don't trust the other fully. The point here is to show some hands-on work with social stakes greater than just us vs them.
We can also zoom in on the specific dynamics of the incoming activists and engineers a bit more. Are they strictly a professional bunch? Do they set up a separate camp with their own rules, schedule, and daily order? Or is it a hodgepodge assortment of skilled people without a prior relationship who move-in to whatever is unoccupied? Perhaps they must stay and board with the locals in their homes. Or perhaps the outsiders are a sect of their own determined to save the locals even if they don't want it.
These decisions will affect how your communities must interact, especially if there's a higher need at stake. Naturally antagonistic relationships could be forced into reluctant collaboration due to circumstance. Such a story would be more difficult to align to the Solarpunk aesthetic, but if well done could act as a moral lesson and strengthens the ideals.
Finally, we should consider what daily life looks like in this small town. Is life oriented around the great infrastructure project or is it a backdrop? Perhaps the boom of construction jobs is over, the children left elsewhere. Is it one of dying cities, where people want to be left alone? Have they been asking for help but no one has answered so far? Are they already self-reliant and happy or working to get there?
One of the most difficult aspects of speculative fiction is the imagining of how everyday life might change due to some unrelated technological advancement. We'll discuss this concept more in further episodes, but for now, try to consider the great infrastructure this town is dealing with and what it does. Is it a power generator, or does it make goods, provide a service, or ease a difficult task. Then, take that purpose and scale it up in your mind. If it was a power generator, now it makes unlimited free power. If it eased a difficult task, now that task's time is reduced to zero. And finally, try to think about how that change would affect the unintentional, everyday things.
When the airplane was invented and fast travel between continents became a reality, nobody ever envisioned a future where you could pop off to London for a stag party weekend.
What is the equivalent mundane change in your world?
Have an interesting idea? Share it with me. This podcast publishes on Mastodon, a federated social network. Our address is in the show notes. Come join us and lets start a conversation.
Until then, I'll talk to you soon on the next Solarpunk Prompt.
Music in this recording is New Unity Dawning, by Bathroom Plants from Global Pattern's compilation Solarpunk: A Brighter Perspective
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odettecarotte · 1 year
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After much prolonged sauntering and many random inquiries, I learnt that there were three ships up for three-years' voyages -- the Devil-dam; the Tit-bit; and the Pequod. Devil-Dam, I do not know the origin of; Tit-bit is obvious; Pequod, you will no doubt remember, was the name of the celebrated tribe of Massachusetts Indians, now extinct as the ancient Medes. I peered and pryed about the Devil-Dam; from her, hopped over to the Tit-bit; and, finally, going on board the Pequod, looked around her for a moment, and then decided this was the very ship for us.
Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
The Pequot were not extinct.
From the Mashantucket  (Western) Pequot Tribal Nation website:
“Tribal History
The history of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation is one of dramatically changing fortunes. Native peoples have continuously occupied Mashantucket in Southeastern Connecticut for over 10,000 years. By the early 17th century, just prior to European contact, the Pequots had approximately 8,000 members and inhabited 250 square miles. However, the Pequot War (1636-1638) -- the first major conflict between colonists and an indigenous New England people -- had a devastating impact on the Tribe.
When the Pequot War formally ended, many tribal members had been killed and others placed in slavery or under the control of other tribes. Those placed under the rule of the Mohegans eventually became known as the Mashantucket (Western) Pequots and were given land at Noank in 1651. In 1666, the land at Noank was taken from the Tribe, and it was given back property at Mashantucket. 
In the ensuing decades, the Pequots battled to keep their land, while at the same time losing reservation members to outside forces. By 1774, a Colonial census indicated that there were 151 tribal members in residence at Mashantucket. By the early 1800s, there were between 30 and 40 as members moved away from the reservation seeking work. Others joined the Brotherton Movement, a Christian-Indian movement that attracted Natives from New England to a settlement in upstate New York and later, Wisconsin. As for the remaining land in Connecticut, by 1856 illegal land sales had reduced the 989-acre reservation to 213 acres.
In the early 1970s, tribal members began moving back to the Mashantucket reservation, hoping to restore their land base and community, develop economic self-sufficiency, and revitalize tribal culture. By the mid-1970s, tribal members had embarked on a series of economic ventures, in addition to instituting legal action to recover illegally seized land.
With the assistance of the Native American Rights Fund and the Indian Rights Association, the Tribe filed suit in 1976 against neighboring landowners to recover land that had been sold by the State of Connecticut in 1856. Seven years later the Pequots reached a settlement with the landowners, who agreed that the 1856 sale was illegal, and who joined the Tribe in seeking the state government's support. The state responded, and the Connecticut Legislature unanimously passed legislation to petition the federal government to grant tribal recognition to the Mashantucket Pequots and settle the claim. With help from the Connecticut delegation, the Mashantucket Pequot Indian Land Claims Settlement Act was enacted by the U.S. Congress and signed by President Reagan on Oct. 18, 1983. It granted the Tribe federal recognition, enabling it to repurchase and place in trust the land covered in the Settlement Act. Currently, the reservation is 1,250 acres.
As the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation sought to settle its land claims, it also actively engaged in a number of economic enterprises, including the sale of cord wood, maple syrup, and garden vegetables, a swine project and the opening of a hydroponic greenhouse. Once the land claims were settled, the Tribe purchased and operated a restaurant, and established a sand and gravel business. In 1986, the Tribe opened its bingo operation, followed, in 1992, by the establishment of the first phase of Foxwoods Resort Casino.The ceremonial groundbreaking for the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center took place on Oct. 20, 1993, in a ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of federal recognition of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation. The new facility, opened on August 11, 1998, is located on the Mashantucket Pequot Reservation, where many members of the Mashantucket Pequot tribal members continue to live. It is one of the oldest, continuously occupied Indian reservations in North America.”
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duganholmgaard96 · 10 months
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12 Commonly Requested Questions On The Worker Retention Credit
The tax credit is the same as 70% of qualified salaries given to workers by certified employers within the fiscal 12 months 2021, with a maximum return of $7,000 per worker each quarter. Amount of the ERC –The ERC is 70% of eligible wages and healthcare costs as much as $10,000 per worker for the related calendar quarter. No ERC Revenue Reduction am I still qualified means that the ERC resets every quarter; thus, the maximum credit per employee is $14,000 for the primary two quarters of 2021. Most useful is that the election could be made for either quarter and it doesn't need to be made for both quarters. This allows a taxpayer that meets the check for one quarter to qualify for two quarters of the 2021 ERC.
Wages reported as payroll costs for PPP mortgage forgiveness or certain different tax credits cannot be claimed for the ERC in any tax interval.
These credit reward qualified corporations for qualifying wage funds, encouraging them to maintain their workers in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic.
If you wish to claim ERC or need details about this tax credit score, hold reading.
If you receive a restaurant revitalization fund grant or a shuttered venues operator grant, the wages you pay with the grant funds can’t be used to assert the ERC.
Employers with greater than 500 workers are not capable of receive an advanceable ERTC. Companies trying to declare the ERTC must report their total certified wages, as properly as the associated medical insurance costs, on their quarterly tax returns . This refundable credit score shall be taken towards the employer’s share of Social Security tax. If you proceed to provide health care benefits to workers who aren’t working, those advantages may be certified wages.
Help On The Means To Get Employee Retention Tax Credit (erc / Ertc): Obtain Up To $26,000 Per Worker For Your Business
In Example 2, the business suffered more than 50% income decline in the second quarter, so it's eligible for the ERC in the second quarter. However, because the third quarter revenues declined by solely 19%, the business won't be able to assert the ERC for the fourth quarter. This is although the fourth quarter revenues were the same because the third quarter. For a enterprise that began in 2019, the quarter the enterprise started should be the bottom of determining the quarterly decline, until the enterprise reaches a yr of operations. For example, a new business that began within the second quarter of 2019 would use that quarter as the base to discover out income decline for either first quarter 2020 or second quarter 2020.
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The self-employment earnings of self-employed individuals are not thought of qualified wages. Employers would compare their 2021 quarterly income to the identical quarter for 2019. The Taxpayer Certainty and Disaster Tax Relief Act of provided numerous changes to the Employee Retention Tax Credit . Most of those adjustments are only relevant beginning Jan. 1, 2021 and solely applied to the first two quarters of 2021. Congress has since extended the ERTC from June 30, 2021 to Dec. 31, 2021. If your organization was not in business in 2019, you would use a corresponding quarter in 2020 to point out you had a revenue discount between 2020 and 2021 and qualify for the ERTC.
The Method To Calculate Worker Retention Credit Score 2021?
Eligible employers should declare the ERC for prior quarters by submitting an applicable adjusted employment tax return within the deadline set forth within the corresponding type directions. The definition of ERTC certified wages and qualified health expenses is noticeably different than the definition used in the PPP law and laws. Under PPP adjustments made as part of the CAA, an employer can assist the PPP mortgage using any period of time within the PPP interval (which is April 1 – December 31, 2020), not simply the eight weeks or 24 weeks offered underneath prior guidance.
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mariacallous · 11 months
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For almost two decades after it opened in 1913, Michigan’s Central Station was a major stop on the nation’s interurban rail network. Then the private car took over the US, and Detroit declined. By the 1970’s, auto jobs were leaving the state and the country and local corruption was soaring.  At the turn of the century, the train depot and the 18-story office towers behind it had been abandoned for 30 years, the faded exterior looming over Detroit’s Corktown and Mexicantown neighborhoods, a sign that things were going very poorly in Detroit. 
By 2018, the city and Ford Motor Company were ready to tell another story. That year, Ford announced that it had acquired the station and the area surrounding it, a monument to the kind of transportation past that the automaker and its manufacturing brethren had all but killed.
Today, Ford executives and city government and community leaders will hold an opening ceremony for one building on the station’s new campus, part of a $950 million project it is calling Michigan Central. (The state of Michigan contributed some additional $126 million in new and existing financing to the project.) The new building, called the Book Depository, will serve as an innovation collaboration space for transportation entrepreneurs and researchers.
Bill Ford, executive chair of Ford, says the campus’ redevelopment is a sign. “Michigan Central will go from being a story about Detroit’s decay to the story about Detroit’s rebirth,” he says, a second act that will see the city become home to tech- and auto-centric jobs that will build the next generation of transport. “This will be the first tangible evidence that that vision is coming to life,” says Ford, who is also a great-grandson of both company founder Henry Ford and tire magnate Harvey Firestone.
Ford is part of a broader movement to revitalize downtown Detroit, though its effects are not yet clear. Detroit lost almost half of its population between 1950 and 2000. Though new downtown sports stadiums, restaurants, and housing developments have strengthened the case of local optimists who see a resurgence underway, recent US censuses suggest that the region continued to bleed residents in the past decade, perhaps due in part to the Covid-19 pandemic. (The city has sued the US Census Bureau over the results, alleging that feds undercounted minority residents, which affects government funding.) 
Ford expects many other businesses to move onto the 30-acre Michigan Central campus, which includes 14 acres of park space open to the public. Today’s opening focuses on the Book Depository, a nearly 100-year-old building across the street from the Central Station that once played host to the Detroit public schools’ store of books, records, and supplies. Now, it will serve as a 270,000-square-foot maker and startup space focused on mobility, a potential spawning ground for future Ford partners. Even before the building’s official opening today, more than 25 companies representing 150 employees have taken up residence at the Book Depository, Michigan Central officials say, representing firms working on autonomous and electric vehicles, roadways built just for robot cars, and air pollution. They are all associated with an organization called Newlab, a manufacturing incubator that has already launched an innovation space in Brooklyn’s Navy Yard. 
The Book Depository’s space is designed to encourage collaboration, says Joshua Sirefman, who as CEO of Michigan Central has led the project’s development and programming. Although the building’s general structure has been preserved, changes have been made to bring it in line with contemporary expectations of premium office space. One example: A series of small skylights that collapsed during the 35 years the structure was vacant were replaced by one large skylight, creating what Sirefman calls a “really extraordinary, naturally lit central space, which I think gives us an incredible communal energy.”
The campus’ opening represents Ford doubling down on its side of a long-simmering conflict between Detroit and Silicon Valley. One origin of the dispute is the moment in 2003 when a bunch of guys got together in San Carlos, California, in Silicon Valley, to found a company called Tesla Motors. Since then, Tesla has used its software chops and a move-fast-and-break-things approach to auto manufacturing to become the most valuable car company in the world. Ford wants to prove that it can do the tech stuff too.
When the Michigan Central project was announced in 2018, “Detroit wasn’t even in the game,” says Ford of the race to infuse autos with tech. “But we are now, and what we provide at the Book Depository building and in the region is the ability to bring together hardware and software in a way that can’t be done elsewhere.” 
Office workers will begin to move into the updated Michigan Central towers behind the historic station in 2024, says Sirefman, though exactly who will work out of the renovated space isn’t yet clear.
Ford announced in 2018 that 5,000 people, half of them the company’s own employees, would work out of the updated train station. But the automaker has moved to a hybrid working model since the pandemic, spokesperson Daniel Barbossa says, so “we have opened up our Ford spaces to be focused on flex space and collaboration.” Updated occupancy numbers will come later this year, he says. Ford has announced that local high school students in a Google-sponsored mentorship program will work out of a lab in the station; 50 students are already enrolled in the program, which is temporarily housed in another building on the campus.
Corktown, the neighborhood to the east of Michigan Central, is a trendy district that was once home to Tiger Stadium but has since become a nightlife destination. Housing and rental prices there have jumped since the announcement of the Ford project. But Ford, the company’s executive chair, believes the project will be beneficial even to those who don’t work on the campus. “In some ways, a rising tide lifts all boats,” he says. 
Rohani Foulke, owner of Folk, a cafe and wine shop that has for almost a decade sat a 10-minute walk from the Central Station, is hopeful the project can boost local businesses that have suffered during the pandemic. “We’re very excited about the project, really in the hopes that it helps bring some regular foot traffic into the neighborhood,” she says. Foulke will also be glad to see the constant construction abate—not only of the Michigan Central campus, but of other developments in the area. “There are insane amounts of noise and dust,” she says. “I can’t tell you how much dust we have to deal with.”
All that dust is a reminder that there is plenty of other work left to do in Detroit, where nearly a third of residents still live in poverty. Brian Boyer, who directs a new degree program in urban technology at the University of Michigan, finds Ford’s ambition—making Detroit the center for transportation innovation—a good one, but insufficient. The city’s future must be broader than cars, trains, and wheels, says Boyer, who is a consultant on one part of Ford’s Michigan Central project. “No matter how successful we are with mobility, the apex for that was the beginning of the 20th century,” he says. “The region needs to have a bigger purpose—a bigger story that we’re asking people to be part of.”
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ledenews · 15 days
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thxnews · 25 days
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Better Kips for Better Trips: A £16 Million Boost
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Key Investments and Innovations Pave the Way for a Revitalized Haulage Sector
In an era where the logistics and haulage industry is often the unsung hero of our economy, ensuring the smooth transit of goods across the nation, the announcement of a £16.5 million investment to upgrade 38 truckstops across England is a beacon of progress and support for our lorry drivers. This joint government and industry initiative marks a significant step towards enhancing the working conditions, security, and welfare facilities for those who keep Britain moving.   A Timely Initiative In the heart of this strategic move is a £6 million contribution from the Department for Transport (DfT), complemented by an additional £10.5 million from the industry itself. This funding is earmarked for substantial improvements, including the installation of new showers and restaurants, enhanced lighting, and more secure fencing around rest areas. Such measures not only promise a safer and more comfortable rest for our drivers but also aim to alleviate local road congestion by introducing approximately 430 new parking spaces for heavy goods vehicles (HGVs).   The Broader Vision This initiative is more than just a facelift for truck stops; it's a cornerstone in the government's broader economic strategy. By improving the working conditions for lorry drivers, the project seeks to support job creation in the haulage industry and attract more individuals to a career in logistics. Furthermore, it aligns with environmental goals by installing new chargepoints for electric HGVs and solar panels on driver facilities, pushing the sector towards sustainability.   A Testament to National Commitment Roads Minister Guy Opperman's remarks underscore the government's recognition of lorry drivers as the backbone of a thriving economy. Additionally, the investment serves as a clear signal of the commitment to ensuring these essential workers have access to modern, safe, and spacious facilities. Importantly, it's an acknowledgment that supporting our drivers is synonymous with growing the economy and securing a brighter future for all.   Strategic Distribution of Funds From Ashford International Truck Stop in Kent to Bardon Truck Park in Leicestershire and Immingham Lorry Park in Lincolnshire, the funds will be distributed to cover a wide geographical area. Consequently, this ensures that the benefits of this project will be felt by lorry drivers throughout England, thereby bringing better working conditions and improved roadside facilities nationwide.   Industry and Government in Tandem The HGV parking and driver welfare grant scheme, which facilitates this investment, is a prime example of effective collaboration between the government and the industry. Furthermore, based on insights from the national survey on lorry parking conducted in 2022, the scheme targets the most needed improvements to enhance the nation's roadside infrastructure. In addition, it addresses the mandatory rest and recovery needs of hauliers, thereby ensuring that our roads remain safe for everyone.  
A Bright Future Ahead
Industry leaders like Declan Pang of the Road Haulage Association (RHA) endorse the project, indicating that it will make a tangible difference in the experiences of lorry drivers. Lorry drivers particularly welcome the additional parking capacity, as it addresses a longstanding issue within the sector. This initiative, alongside others like the £8.3 billion funding for road resurfacing and the push towards zero-emission trucks, paints a promising picture for the future of logistics in Britain.   In Conclusion The £16.5 million investment in truckstop upgrades is a laudable step towards recognizing and supporting the vital role of lorry drivers in our economy. It is a commitment to not only the immediate welfare of these workers but also to the long-term sustainability and efficiency of the logistics sector. As we look forward to the tangible improvements these upgrades will bring, it is clear that this initiative is a pivotal move towards a more secure, comfortable, and sustainable future for the backbone of Britain's economy.   Sources: THX News, Department for Transport & Guy Opperman MP. Read the full article
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5mybestarticles · 11 years
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Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel
The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market
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In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.
The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.
In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.
The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.
They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.
Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”
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By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.
The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?
Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.
When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”
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chrisfrominvis · 11 years
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Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel
The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market
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In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.
The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.
In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.
The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.
They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.
Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”
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By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.
The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?
Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.
When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”
Promotions featured an airbrushed picture of Trump, along with a personal endorsement: “We’re going to do something very special in Toronto.” Trump himself, the ad said, “has an undeniably keen eye for a deal.” The ad neglected to mention that Trump wasn’t the project’s developer, just its smiling face.
Sarbjit Singh, a 49-year-old warehouse supervisor from Milton, was one of the early buyers. Singh first heard about the Trump in October 2006 from a real estate agent who told him it was a great investment opportunity. He and his wife, Kimberly, had recently bought a house and just had their second daughter. He didn’t have the money to buy another property. “I was only making between $50,000 and $60,000 a year,” he says. “I’m a regular person, not rich.”
But the prospect of getting his own piece of Trump magic proved too tempting. He claims the agents at the Trump sales centre told him he couldn’t possibly lose money since the “absolute worst case scenario” was that the hotel ended up at 55 per cent occupancy, and even then the projected returns were healthy. “I asked them a long list of questions,” he recalls. Who was going to arrange the mortgages? What would the interest rate be? Would the property be categorized as commercial or residential (commercial properties come with much higher interest rates). He alleges the sales associate assured him he had nothing to worry about. According to Singh, they said Talon was already working on financing with lenders, and it would all go smoothly. The units would qualify for residential mortgages. Singh then asked at what point he could flip the unit, and the agent told him directly after closing. “You’ll make a lot of money,” he remembers the agent telling him. “Even if you don’t sell, you’ll be making lots of money from the reservation program.”
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Armed with Talon’s projection sheet, his head dancing with trust funds for his daughters, Singh went to his mother and father, who are retired and living on a pension. He convinced them to take out a $150,000 line of credit on their house, which they owned outright, so he could put down a deposit of $173,400 on an $869,000 suite. He believed, like many other investors I spoke to, that he was buying a piece of real estate directly from Donald Trump and that he couldn’t lose. “I bought it on the strength of his name alone. He’s Donald Trump—hotels and real estate are his business, not mine. I trusted that it would work.”
Construction of the Trump Tower got off to an inauspicious start. It took two years to receive planning permission from the city, and there were more delays after Talon broke ground in late 2007. Because of the site’s small footprint—15,000 square feet—only one crane could be employed at a time. Shnaider admitted it was a bit of a nightmare. “I wouldn’t do such a project again in Toronto,” he said. More significantly for investors, the economic reality changed. As Levitan put it, “It was a very complicated project that became delayed, and in that time the economy fell apart. How can I control that?” In the new market, the projection sheets Talon had distributed with the initial sales package weren’t worth the creamy stationery they were printed on.
In March 2012, Sarbjit Singh took possession of his unit and started paying monthly fees of $8,207, which covered realty taxes, common fees and interest. He expected his rental profits to more than offset the fees, but when the first revenue statements came in, he knew something was wrong: in four months, his unit had been rented 49 times—roughly a 40 per cent occupancy rate and lower than the “absolute worst case scenario” the agent had discussed with him. Singh’s room was running at a loss. When he called hotel management, they told him the bad news: because of the dampened hotel market, they’d been renting his room out at a discounted rate. (Rooms at the Trump that were forecast to cost $550 to $600 per night have been available for $400 on Expedia.) Singh was losing approximately $5,000 a month.
His problems didn’t end there. He visited several major banks and was told the property was commercial, not residential, and thus he’d need a commercial mortgage, for which he’d need to put 50 per cent down—money he didn’t have. Even if he could find the down payment, the commercial interest rates would raise his mortgage payments beyond what he could afford to carry.
Last November, Singh ran out of reserve cash. He stopped paying his fees and is now working in the evenings and on weekends in an effort to pay his parents’ line of credit. He recently missed a mortgage payment. He has no idea how he’ll get out of debt.
Singh retained the Toronto law firm Heydary Hamil­ton last November and filed a suit against the developers. Another 37 buyers have also filed suits. A Heydary lawyer named Mitchell Wine, one of the team of 14 lawyers and articling students working on the Trump cases, told me purchasers and representatives of more than 100 units have contacted his office. The firm has filed statements of claim detailing each of the investors’ stories and accusing Talon and other named parties of misrepresentation, breaches of the Ontario Securities Act, breach of contract, breach of the Condominium Act and conspiracy. Each claimant is asking for well over a million dollars in damages, plus their deposit money back with interest. Pleadings are being finalized, and preliminary motions were scheduled to be heard just after this issue went to press. In response, Talon is seeking to have the action by investors dismissed.
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The investors’ suits name Trump Toronto Hotel Management Group and Talon International Inc., as well as Trump, Shnaider and Levitan personally. They allege that the defendants misled investors about the units by providing financial projections that overstated how much they would earn, and by understating expenses (such as occupancy fees). According to the investors’ statements of claim, Talon breached the Ontario Securities Act by selling the units as investment products.
The plaintiffs’ cases centre on a 2004 OSC ruling, which required Talon to market the units as mainly for occupancy, not as investments. Talon was also prohibited from forecasting or guaranteeing profits from the reservation program. And yet, included in the Trump’s original sales package are several charts entitled Estimated Return on Investment, which show detailed breakdowns of the income buyers could expect from their condo-hotel suites. They describe projected common expense fees, housekeeping expenses, estimated taxes and a mortgage projected at six per cent interest. The rental income, in turn, is projected at hotel occupancy rates of 75, 65 and 55 per cent.
Late last year, the OSC investigated the Trump deal to determine whether regulatory action was needed. They met with purchasers and Talon’s lawyers, read over all the documents, and in early December announced they would not be pursuing regulatory action on the matter. When I asked for an explanation, the OSC refused to provide one. The investors’ suits will proceed regardless of the December decision.
The fact is, Talon did warn the Trump buyers about the risks involved in buying condo-hotel units in its disclosure. “A real estate investment is, by its nature, speculative,” the document states. “If a purchaser is purchasing the real estate as an investment, the purchaser should be aware that this investment has not only the usual risks when purchasing real estate, but also those risks that are inherent to the nature of real estate securities.”
A disclaimer in the Trump disclosure lists a series of variables, many of which might seem alarmist if they hadn’t come to pass. These include, but are not limited to, “cyclical downturns arising from real changes in general and local economic conditions; varying levels of demand for rooms and related services caused by changes in travel patterns; the financial condition of the airline industry and the resulting impact on air travel…contagious illness outbreaks, natural disasters, extreme weather conditions, labour shortages, work stoppages or disputes.” There is also a clause, as required by the Condominium Act, stating that each buyer, upon receiving and reading the disclosure document, has 10 days to back out of the deal. According to Levitan, five people did just that.
Investors like Singh claim they didn’t take the warnings about risks seriously because they’d been completely convinced that the investment was a sure bet. It’s a bit like your trusted GP prescribing you a medication and then rattling off the side effects in a super-fast radio ad voice as you leave the office. If what these buyers say is true, the Trump sales team underplayed the risks and overplayed the benefits of buying their condo-hotel units. But sales pitches are hyperbolic by design.
Talon’s statement of defence denies all wrongdoing, including the allegations of misrepresentation and breaching an OSC ruling, and demands the investors forfeit their deposits and pay individual damages of $750,000 each. Levitan says they have a good case for further damages, due to all the bad press the case has received, but they are still “hoping for an amicable solution.”
In Talon’s specific response to Singh’s claim, the company denies that the Trump sales agents promised he could get a residential mortgage or guaranteed a rate of return from the reservation program. It also denies that any promotional material he received breached the OSC ruling. In Levitan’s view, the buyers’ lawsuits are purely opportunistic and won’t stand up in court. Normally, if buyers want to walk away from a deal, a developer will buy back their investment. But the Trump units were sold at the peak of the market. As Levitan points out, “Everything has changed.” Given this reality, Talon is not eager to buy back the units it sold off for millions in the middle of the condo boom. That’s how people—and developers—make money: buying low and selling high. Why should they absorb the cost of others’ bad financial timing?
The group of disgruntled buyers, Levitan says, is primarily composed of people who did not attempt to rescind the deal in the allotted time frame, then realized they couldn’t secure financing and decided to file suit. The fact that they don’t have the money to close only shows that they probably shouldn’t have taken the risk in the first place. “Instead they claim that they thought they were buying from Donald Trump and we promised them a rose garden,” Levitan says with a snort. “It’s a pure form of extortion.”
He says he’s sad for the people who got in over their heads. He’d prefer “the world to be a rosy place in which people are always happy with their investments,” but that didn’t happen with Trump. “So what am I supposed to do?” he says. “Go to the drywall contractor and say, ‘Sorry, but I can’t pay you because 30 investors aren’t paying me?’ ”
Raymond Diep, a Toronto real estate lawyer at the firm Aaron & Aaron, which handled a number of the Trump condo-hotel closings, said his firm’s clients weren’t happy about losing money each month, but they chose to take a long-term view on the investment. “They realized that things might be negative now, but in the end the market would go up again.”
None of Aaron & Aaron’s clients were going to go personally bankrupt on the Trump deal; they absorbed their losses and decided to wait it out. Diep believes the Heydary lawyers are cashing in on private desperation. “They’re making it look like a shady investment, but it’s not really like that. The investors had high expectations. It was the height of the market. Now that it’s slowed down, they’re having regrets about it. It’s that simple.”
Sarbjit Singh, who is in no position to close in cash, says that Talon should have said that only investors of high net worth need apply. Instead, the Trump project was sold as a great investment for people of modest means, like himself. “If you need to be a millionaire to close, they should have targeted millionaires.”
Donald Trump declined to speak with me, but Ivanka, his daughter, agreed. The 32-year-old is vice-president of development and acquisitions for the Trump Organization. When I reached her, she was in the back of a chauffeur-driven car on the way to the airport. “It was very important to me to give you some time,” she said the moment she got on the phone. Ivanka is a glamorous blond jewellery designer and former model with a business degree from Wharton. Over the years, her father has used her as the new face of Trump, trotting her out at public events and even appointing her as a judge on The Apprentice.
Ivanka is an excellent human shield for her father, who is no stranger to lawsuits. He has been sued by investors on several hotel projects and has launched his own litany of suits against a long list of perceived offenders, including an unauthorized biographer, a former Miss U.S.A. contestant, Deutsche Bank and the comedian Bill Maher, who offered, on The Tonight Show, to pay Trump $5 million if he could prove his father was not an orangutan. Trump sent him a copy of his birth certificate, but Maher did not pay up.
Ivanka said she is staggered by the investors’ claims that they believed they were buying their units directly from Trump.
“I don’t know of many people who wouldn’t retain a lawyer to explain to them how this relationship works,” she says. “It’s articulated exactly in the purchase documents… We’re just like the Ritz or the Four Seasons. It’s not different in any way.”
She says the claims against her father and his company are completely without merit. When I point out that people were led to believe they would make money and now they are losing it—and, similarly, that they would be able to secure financing where now they cannot—Ivanka bridles, her voice rising in the controlled manner of one who is used to conflict but not to having her authority questioned. She points out, quite rightly, that with any investment, whatever the asset class, and especially with real estate, those who approach things with a long-term perspective tend to do best. She says the unhappy buyers in the Trump Toronto case are suffering from a severe case of buyer’s remorse—which is nobody’s problem but their own.
She objects to the implication that the investors were misled in any way, and each time I try to suggest that perhaps the sales tactics were overly aggressive, she jumps in and loudly talks over me, extolling what she calls “the beauty of the asset,” by which she means the hotel itself.
“I wish that everyone could be happy, but sometimes these things can be a challenge,” she says airily. “It’s important to remember that the lawsuit doesn’t relate to us in any way. We have no contracts with these people, and we didn’t sell them real estate.” With that, she declares she must go, says a quick goodbye and hangs up.
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marshallstrue · 11 years
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Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel
The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market
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In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.
The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.
In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.
The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.
They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.
Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”
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By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.
The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?
Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.
When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”
Promotions featured an airbrushed picture of Trump, along with a personal endorsement: “We’re going to do something very special in Toronto.” Trump himself, the ad said, “has an undeniably keen eye for a deal.” The ad neglected to mention that Trump wasn’t the project’s developer, just its smiling face.
Sarbjit Singh, a 49-year-old warehouse supervisor from Milton, was one of the early buyers. Singh first heard about the Trump in October 2006 from a real estate agent who told him it was a great investment opportunity. He and his wife, Kimberly, had recently bought a house and just had their second daughter. He didn’t have the money to buy another property. “I was only making between $50,000 and $60,000 a year,” he says. “I’m a regular person, not rich.”
But the prospect of getting his own piece of Trump magic proved too tempting. He claims the agents at the Trump sales centre told him he couldn’t possibly lose money since the “absolute worst case scenario” was that the hotel ended up at 55 per cent occupancy, and even then the projected returns were healthy. “I asked them a long list of questions,” he recalls. Who was going to arrange the mortgages? What would the interest rate be? Would the property be categorized as commercial or residential (commercial properties come with much higher interest rates). He alleges the sales associate assured him he had nothing to worry about. According to Singh, they said Talon was already working on financing with lenders, and it would all go smoothly. The units would qualify for residential mortgages. Singh then asked at what point he could flip the unit, and the agent told him directly after closing. “You’ll make a lot of money,” he remembers the agent telling him. “Even if you don’t sell, you’ll be making lots of money from the reservation program.”
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Armed with Talon’s projection sheet, his head dancing with trust funds for his daughters, Singh went to his mother and father, who are retired and living on a pension. He convinced them to take out a $150,000 line of credit on their house, which they owned outright, so he could put down a deposit of $173,400 on an $869,000 suite. He believed, like many other investors I spoke to, that he was buying a piece of real estate directly from Donald Trump and that he couldn’t lose. “I bought it on the strength of his name alone. He’s Donald Trump—hotels and real estate are his business, not mine. I trusted that it would work.”
Construction of the Trump Tower got off to an inauspicious start. It took two years to receive planning permission from the city, and there were more delays after Talon broke ground in late 2007. Because of the site’s small footprint—15,000 square feet—only one crane could be employed at a time. Shnaider admitted it was a bit of a nightmare. “I wouldn’t do such a project again in Toronto,” he said. More significantly for investors, the economic reality changed. As Levitan put it, “It was a very complicated project that became delayed, and in that time the economy fell apart. How can I control that?” In the new market, the projection sheets Talon had distributed with the initial sales package weren’t worth the creamy stationery they were printed on.
In March 2012, Sarbjit Singh took possession of his unit and started paying monthly fees of $8,207, which covered realty taxes, common fees and interest. He expected his rental profits to more than offset the fees, but when the first revenue statements came in, he knew something was wrong: in four months, his unit had been rented 49 times—roughly a 40 per cent occupancy rate and lower than the “absolute worst case scenario” the agent had discussed with him. Singh’s room was running at a loss. When he called hotel management, they told him the bad news: because of the dampened hotel market, they’d been renting his room out at a discounted rate. (Rooms at the Trump that were forecast to cost $550 to $600 per night have been available for $400 on Expedia.) Singh was losing approximately $5,000 a month.
His problems didn’t end there. He visited several major banks and was told the property was commercial, not residential, and thus he’d need a commercial mortgage, for which he’d need to put 50 per cent down—money he didn’t have. Even if he could find the down payment, the commercial interest rates would raise his mortgage payments beyond what he could afford to carry.
Last November, Singh ran out of reserve cash. He stopped paying his fees and is now working in the evenings and on weekends in an effort to pay his parents’ line of credit. He recently missed a mortgage payment. He has no idea how he’ll get out of debt.
Singh retained the Toronto law firm Heydary Hamil­ton last November and filed a suit against the developers. Another 37 buyers have also filed suits. A Heydary lawyer named Mitchell Wine, one of the team of 14 lawyers and articling students working on the Trump cases, told me purchasers and representatives of more than 100 units have contacted his office. The firm has filed statements of claim detailing each of the investors’ stories and accusing Talon and other named parties of misrepresentation, breaches of the Ontario Securities Act, breach of contract, breach of the Condominium Act and conspiracy. Each claimant is asking for well over a million dollars in damages, plus their deposit money back with interest. Pleadings are being finalized, and preliminary motions were scheduled to be heard just after this issue went to press. In response, Talon is seeking to have the action by investors dismissed.
The investors’ suits name Trump Toronto Hotel Management Group and Talon International Inc., as well as Trump, Shnaider and Levitan personally. They allege that the defendants misled investors about the units by providing financial projections that overstated how much they would earn, and by understating expenses (such as occupancy fees). According to the investors’ statements of claim, Talon breached the Ontario Securities Act by selling the units as investment products.
The plaintiffs’ cases centre on a 2004 OSC ruling, which required Talon to market the units as mainly for occupancy, not as investments. Talon was also prohibited from forecasting or guaranteeing profits from the reservation program. And yet, included in the Trump’s original sales package are several charts entitled Estimated Return on Investment, which show detailed breakdowns of the income buyers could expect from their condo-hotel suites. They describe projected common expense fees, housekeeping expenses, estimated taxes and a mortgage projected at six per cent interest. The rental income, in turn, is projected at hotel occupancy rates of 75, 65 and 55 per cent.
Late last year, the OSC investigated the Trump deal to determine whether regulatory action was needed. They met with purchasers and Talon’s lawyers, read over all the documents, and in early December announced they would not be pursuing regulatory action on the matter. When I asked for an explanation, the OSC refused to provide one. The investors’ suits will proceed regardless of the December decision.
The fact is, Talon did warn the Trump buyers about the risks involved in buying condo-hotel units in its disclosure. “A real estate investment is, by its nature, speculative,” the document states. “If a purchaser is purchasing the real estate as an investment, the purchaser should be aware that this investment has not only the usual risks when purchasing real estate, but also those risks that are inherent to the nature of real estate securities.”
A disclaimer in the Trump disclosure lists a series of variables, many of which might seem alarmist if they hadn’t come to pass. These include, but are not limited to, “cyclical downturns arising from real changes in general and local economic conditions; varying levels of demand for rooms and related services caused by changes in travel patterns; the financial condition of the airline industry and the resulting impact on air travel…contagious illness outbreaks, natural disasters, extreme weather conditions, labour shortages, work stoppages or disputes.” There is also a clause, as required by the Condominium Act, stating that each buyer, upon receiving and reading the disclosure document, has 10 days to back out of the deal. According to Levitan, five people did just that.
Investors like Singh claim they didn’t take the warnings about risks seriously because they’d been completely convinced that the investment was a sure bet. It’s a bit like your trusted GP prescribing you a medication and then rattling off the side effects in a super-fast radio ad voice as you leave the office. If what these buyers say is true, the Trump sales team underplayed the risks and overplayed the benefits of buying their condo-hotel units. But sales pitches are hyperbolic by design.
Talon’s statement of defence denies all wrongdoing, including the allegations of misrepresentation and breaching an OSC ruling, and demands the investors forfeit their deposits and pay individual damages of $750,000 each. Levitan says they have a good case for further damages, due to all the bad press the case has received, but they are still “hoping for an amicable solution.”
In Talon’s specific response to Singh’s claim, the company denies that the Trump sales agents promised he could get a residential mortgage or guaranteed a rate of return from the reservation program. It also denies that any promotional material he received breached the OSC ruling. In Levitan’s view, the buyers’ lawsuits are purely opportunistic and won’t stand up in court. Normally, if buyers want to walk away from a deal, a developer will buy back their investment. But the Trump units were sold at the peak of the market. As Levitan points out, “Everything has changed.” Given this reality, Talon is not eager to buy back the units it sold off for millions in the middle of the condo boom. That’s how people—and developers—make money: buying low and selling high. Why should they absorb the cost of others’ bad financial timing?
The group of disgruntled buyers, Levitan says, is primarily composed of people who did not attempt to rescind the deal in the allotted time frame, then realized they couldn’t secure financing and decided to file suit. The fact that they don’t have the money to close only shows that they probably shouldn’t have taken the risk in the first place. “Instead they claim that they thought they were buying from Donald Trump and we promised them a rose garden,” Levitan says with a snort. “It’s a pure form of extortion.”
He says he’s sad for the people who got in over their heads. He’d prefer “the world to be a rosy place in which people are always happy with their investments,” but that didn’t happen with Trump. “So what am I supposed to do?” he says. “Go to the drywall contractor and say, ‘Sorry, but I can’t pay you because 30 investors aren’t paying me?’ ”
Raymond Diep, a Toronto real estate lawyer at the firm Aaron & Aaron, which handled a number of the Trump condo-hotel closings, said his firm’s clients weren’t happy about losing money each month, but they chose to take a long-term view on the investment. “They realized that things might be negative now, but in the end the market would go up again.”
None of Aaron & Aaron’s clients were going to go personally bankrupt on the Trump deal; they absorbed their losses and decided to wait it out. Diep believes the Heydary lawyers are cashing in on private desperation. “They’re making it look like a shady investment, but it’s not really like that. The investors had high expectations. It was the height of the market. Now that it’s slowed down, they’re having regrets about it. It’s that simple.”
Sarbjit Singh, who is in no position to close in cash, says that Talon should have said that only investors of high net worth need apply. Instead, the Trump project was sold as a great investment for people of modest means, like himself. “If you need to be a millionaire to close, they should have targeted millionaires.”
Donald Trump declined to speak with me, but Ivanka, his daughter, agreed. The 32-year-old is vice-president of development and acquisitions for the Trump Organization. When I reached her, she was in the back of a chauffeur-driven car on the way to the airport. “It was very important to me to give you some time,” she said the moment she got on the phone. Ivanka is a glamorous blond jewellery designer and former model with a business degree from Wharton. Over the years, her father has used her as the new face of Trump, trotting her out at public events and even appointing her as a judge on The Apprentice.
Ivanka is an excellent human shield for her father, who is no stranger to lawsuits. He has been sued by investors on several hotel projects and has launched his own litany of suits against a long list of perceived offenders, including an unauthorized biographer, a former Miss U.S.A. contestant, Deutsche Bank and the comedian Bill Maher, who offered, on The Tonight Show, to pay Trump $5 million if he could prove his father was not an orangutan. Trump sent him a copy of his birth certificate, but Maher did not pay up.
Ivanka said she is staggered by the investors’ claims that they believed they were buying their units directly from Trump.
“I don’t know of many people who wouldn’t retain a lawyer to explain to them how this relationship works,” she says. “It’s articulated exactly in the purchase documents… We’re just like the Ritz or the Four Seasons. It’s not different in any way.”
She says the claims against her father and his company are completely without merit. When I point out that people were led to believe they would make money and now they are losing it—and, similarly, that they would be able to secure financing where now they cannot—Ivanka bridles, her voice rising in the controlled manner of one who is used to conflict but not to having her authority questioned. She points out, quite rightly, that with any investment, whatever the asset class, and especially with real estate, those who approach things with a long-term perspective tend to do best. She says the unhappy buyers in the Trump Toronto case are suffering from a severe case of buyer’s remorse—which is nobody’s problem but their own.
She objects to the implication that the investors were misled in any way, and each time I try to suggest that perhaps the sales tactics were overly aggressive, she jumps in and loudly talks over me, extolling what she calls “the beauty of the asset,” by which she means the hotel itself.
“I wish that everyone could be happy, but sometimes these things can be a challenge,” she says airily. “It’s important to remember that the lawsuit doesn’t relate to us in any way. We have no contracts with these people, and we didn’t sell them real estate.” With that, she declares she must go, says a quick goodbye and hangs up.
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dirtymoneyenough · 11 years
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Trumped: the multi-million-dollar lawsuit over Toronto’s most controversial new condo-hotel
The Trump tower, downtown’s tallest new condo-hotel, is a monument to excess. And, like its tycoon namesake, it’s surrounded by controversy: 38 investors are suing the hotel for millions. Lessons from a post-crash real estate market
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In the city’s new five-star hotel landscape, the Ritz represents elegant European classicism, the Shangri-La cool, Asian chic, and the Trump unfettered American pomp. Like its loud-mouthed namesake, the Trump is brash, proud and full of bluster. Stock, the hotel’s restaurant and bar, is outfitted with shiny tufted black leather seating and silver accents. Its lobby, a shimmering expanse of marble and mirrors, seems sprung, fully formed, from the imagination of Joan Collins.
The hotel’s developer, Talon International, is run by Val Levitan and Alex Shnaider, two Russian-Canadian entrepreneurs. Levitan made his fortune manufacturing slot machines and creating bank note validation technology, and Shnaider earned his in the post-glasnost steel trade. The Trump is their first Toronto real estate venture. In 2002, during a meeting in Shnaider’s office at Dufferin and Finch, they agreed on a plan to build the city’s biggest, fanciest, five-starriest hotel. They both travel frequently for work and agreed that Toronto’s hotels lacked the quality of the ones they stayed at in London, New York and Moscow. Back then, Toronto’s swankiest option was the old Four Seasons, a dour brutalist tower in Yorkville. But the city was emerging as a major North American financial centre, a place where serious players were coming to do big international deals. These titans were in need of boardrooms in which to meet, bloody steaks to consume, and high-thread-count sheets to sleep between.
In 2004, Talon bought a site at the corner of Bay and Adelaide for $27.4 million. The location was perfect—smack in the centre of the business district. This was before the cultural revitalization of the city’s downtown core, but Levitan and Shnaider could see the signs: the revamping of the Bay’s flagship department store, the plans for the new Bell Lightbox, not to mention a phalanx of condos and restaurants springing up in the city centre. By the time the hotel was completed, it would be the anchor point of a tourist-friendly downtown.
The luxury hotel required a famous brand, which is how the pair ended up approaching Donald Trump. At the time, Trump’s reality show The Apprentice was riding high in the ratings, and the Trump brand was associated with luxury, success and business prowess, not with headline-making Twitter spats and an aborted Republican leadership bid. They worked out a deal to license the Trump name.
They planned a 65-storey mixed-use building consisting of a restaurant and bar, a day spa, 118 condos—some as large as 4,400 square feet and selling for up to $9.1 million—and 261 “condo-hotel suites,” traditional hotel rooms that Talon intended to sell as residential real estate investments. The condo-hotel set-up was unusual in Toronto. It’s an attractive model for developers because it allows them to raise capital up front from investors.
Donald Trump is a shareholder in other Trump developments in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, but not in Toronto. The hotel would bear his name and his style, and an affiliate of his management company would run the day-to-day hotel service. According to the early marketing brochures, it would be a model for “Manhattan-style luxury living in Toronto.”
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By the time the Trump opened in 2012, ten years after the plan was hatched and more than two years later than originally scheduled, the financial climate had, of course, drastically changed. The hotel now felt like a throwback to a cockier, pre-recession era, back when hedge fund managers ruled the world and Bernie Madoff was a respected financial guru. A group of buyers now regret their investment in the building, and millions of dollars in deals between them and Talon are on the verge of collapsing. The group claims their condo-hotel units often sit empty, and they’ve launched a series of lawsuits alleging the Trump sales team misrepresented how much profit they’d make. The defendants say the lawsuits have no merit, that no misrepresentations were made. The claims have yet to be heard in court.
The Trump investors believed they’d bought into a get-rich-quick scheme. How did something so promising go so wrong?
Before there was the Trump Tower, there was the Trump tower sales office, a glass-fronted box that stood on the same prime corner from which the hotel would eventually rise. A polished young sales team sold a steady stream of units, over the phone, online and in person, to a diverse cross-section of buyers—including elderly Korean pensioners, wealthy Nigerians and a now-defunct U.K. company called WorldWide Properties, which bought four floors of hotel units with the intention of flipping them.
When the Trump broke ground, half of the residential condos had sold, as had 191 of the condo-hotel units, which ranged in price from $736,000 to $3.8 million. The suites could be rented out as part of the hotel, providing extra income to buyers. In the Trump system, occupancies are organized in a strict, computerized rotation, which ensures that the least rented room jumps to the front of the queue. The hotel charges service fees for maintenance (linens, towels, cleaning, etc.) and management, but the rest of the rental profit goes to the owner of the room. The promotional material declared that “investing in hotel suites is a trend that’s sweeping the United States… The reason? Great cash flows, no concern for maintenance and reasonable cash requirements as a down payment. Leverage is key, especially in these times of low interest rates.”
Promotions featured an airbrushed picture of Trump, along with a personal endorsement: “We’re going to do something very special in Toronto.” Trump himself, the ad said, “has an undeniably keen eye for a deal.” The ad neglected to mention that Trump wasn’t the project’s developer, just its smiling face.
Sarbjit Singh, a 49-year-old warehouse supervisor from Milton, was one of the early buyers. Singh first heard about the Trump in October 2006 from a real estate agent who told him it was a great investment opportunity. He and his wife, Kimberly, had recently bought a house and just had their second daughter. He didn’t have the money to buy another property. “I was only making between $50,000 and $60,000 a year,” he says. “I’m a regular person, not rich.”
But the prospect of getting his own piece of Trump magic proved too tempting. He claims the agents at the Trump sales centre told him he couldn’t possibly lose money since the “absolute worst case scenario” was that the hotel ended up at 55 per cent occupancy, and even then the projected returns were healthy. “I asked them a long list of questions,” he recalls. Who was going to arrange the mortgages? What would the interest rate be? Would the property be categorized as commercial or residential (commercial properties come with much higher interest rates). He alleges the sales associate assured him he had nothing to worry about. According to Singh, they said Talon was already working on financing with lenders, and it would all go smoothly. The units would qualify for residential mortgages. Singh then asked at what point he could flip the unit, and the agent told him directly after closing. “You’ll make a lot of money,” he remembers the agent telling him. “Even if you don’t sell, you’ll be making lots of money from the reservation program.”
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Armed with Talon’s projection sheet, his head dancing with trust funds for his daughters, Singh went to his mother and father, who are retired and living on a pension. He convinced them to take out a $150,000 line of credit on their house, which they owned outright, so he could put down a deposit of $173,400 on an $869,000 suite. He believed, like many other investors I spoke to, that he was buying a piece of real estate directly from Donald Trump and that he couldn’t lose. “I bought it on the strength of his name alone. He’s Donald Trump—hotels and real estate are his business, not mine. I trusted that it would work.”
Construction of the Trump Tower got off to an inauspicious start. It took two years to receive planning permission from the city, and there were more delays after Talon broke ground in late 2007. Because of the site’s small footprint—15,000 square feet—only one crane could be employed at a time. Shnaider admitted it was a bit of a nightmare. “I wouldn’t do such a project again in Toronto,” he said. More significantly for investors, the economic reality changed. As Levitan put it, “It was a very complicated project that became delayed, and in that time the economy fell apart. How can I control that?” In the new market, the projection sheets Talon had distributed with the initial sales package weren’t worth the creamy stationery they were printed on.
In March 2012, Sarbjit Singh took possession of his unit and started paying monthly fees of $8,207, which covered realty taxes, common fees and interest. He expected his rental profits to more than offset the fees, but when the first revenue statements came in, he knew something was wrong: in four months, his unit had been rented 49 times—roughly a 40 per cent occupancy rate and lower than the “absolute worst case scenario” the agent had discussed with him. Singh’s room was running at a loss. When he called hotel management, they told him the bad news: because of the dampened hotel market, they’d been renting his room out at a discounted rate. (Rooms at the Trump that were forecast to cost $550 to $600 per night have been available for $400 on Expedia.) Singh was losing approximately $5,000 a month.
His problems didn’t end there. He visited several major banks and was told the property was commercial, not residential, and thus he’d need a commercial mortgage, for which he’d need to put 50 per cent down—money he didn’t have. Even if he could find the down payment, the commercial interest rates would raise his mortgage payments beyond what he could afford to carry.
Last November, Singh ran out of reserve cash. He stopped paying his fees and is now working in the evenings and on weekends in an effort to pay his parents’ line of credit. He recently missed a mortgage payment. He has no idea how he’ll get out of debt.
Singh retained the Toronto law firm Heydary Hamil­ton last November and filed a suit against the developers. Another 37 buyers have also filed suits. A Heydary lawyer named Mitchell Wine, one of the team of 14 lawyers and articling students working on the Trump cases, told me purchasers and representatives of more than 100 units have contacted his office. The firm has filed statements of claim detailing each of the investors’ stories and accusing Talon and other named parties of misrepresentation, breaches of the Ontario Securities Act, breach of contract, breach of the Condominium Act and conspiracy. Each claimant is asking for well over a million dollars in damages, plus their deposit money back with interest. Pleadings are being finalized, and preliminary motions were scheduled to be heard just after this issue went to press. In response, Talon is seeking to have the action by investors dismissed.
to be continued...
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content23423 · 7 months
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Personal tradelines in USA , CANADA  | Restaurants loan In USA, CANADA 
When seeking restaurant loans, reputable lenders include Funding Circle and BlueVine in the USA, and RBC Royal Bank and BMO Bank of Montreal in Canada. Evaluate interest rates, repayment terms, and eligibility requirements to find the best fit for your personal tradelines or restaurant loan needs. Best Personal tradelines in USA , CANADA  | Restaurants loan In USA, CANADA.In the USA and Canada, trusted sources for personal tradelines include companies like Tradeline Supply Company and Superior Tradelines. Enhance your credit profile with personalized tradelines in the USA and Canada, courtesy of [Wambui]. Our carefully selected tradelines can boost your credit score by adding positive payment history to your report. Whether you're applying for loans, mortgages, or better interest rates, our tradeline solutions offer a tailored approach to improve your creditworthiness. Take control of your financial future by exploring our range of effective tradeline options. Elevate your credit score with [Wambui] today.  Fuel your culinary dreams with specialized restaurant loans available in the USA and Canada. At [Wambui], we understand the unique needs of the restaurant industry. Our tailored financing solutions can help you open, expand, or revitalize your restaurant business. Benefit from competitive rates and expert guidance as you navigate the lending process. Secure the funds you need to create a thriving dining experience. Apply now to turn your restaurant vision into reality with [Wambui].
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mystlnewsonline · 10 months
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Restaurant Owners Charged with COVID-Relief Fraud
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San Diego Restaurant Owners Leronce Suel and Ravae Smith Charged with COVID-Relief Fraud and Money Laundering (STL.News) A federal grand jury in San Diego returned an indictment on May 19 charging a California man and woman with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering. According to the indictment, Leronce Suel and Ravae Smith owned Rockstar Dough LLC and Chicken Feed LLC, both of which operated a series of restaurants in the San Diego area.  From March 2020 to June 2022, Suel and Smith allegedly conspired to underreport over $1.7 million in gross receipts on Rockstar Dough LLC’s 2020 corporate tax return (From the 1120S) filed with the IRS in order to qualify for the COVID-related Paycheck Protection Program and Restaurant Revitalization Funding loans.  Suel and Smith also allegedly made materially false certifications on loan applications regarding the use of the money.  The indictment charges that Suel and Smith made substantial cash withdrawals from their business bank accounts to launder the fraudulently obtained funds.  As part of the conspiracy, Suel and Smith allegedly concealed more than $2.4 million in cash at their residence. Suel and Smith made their initial court appearance yesterday before U.S. Magistrate Judge William V. Gallo of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.  If convicted, they face a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison for wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud and ten years in prison for money laundering.  A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and U.S. Attorney Randy S. Grossman for the Southern District of California made the announcement. “During an unprecedented public health emergency, the United States provided these loan programs to deliver economic relief to Americans,” said U.S. Attorney Randy Grossman for the Southern District of California.  “This office will investigate and prosecute those who exploited the global pandemic to unjustly enrich themselves.  We encourage anyone with information regarding individuals who have engaged in COVID-relief fraud to come forward.” Grossman thanked the prosecution team and the investigative agency for their excellent work on this case. “The CARES Act was passed to aid those in need and provide much-needed relief during the Covid-19 pandemic.  Unfortunately, there are individuals and organizations who took advantage and targeted these programs to steal funds,” said Special Agent in Charge Tyler Hatcher of the Los Angeles Field Office.  “Submitting false returns in support of a fraudulent loan application is a crime.  IRS-CI is committed to aggressively investigating these crimes and bringing those to justice who stole funds and targeted relief programs during the pandemic.” The IRS-Criminal Investigation is investigating the case. Trial Attorney Julia Rugg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher Beeler of the Southern District of California are prosecuting the case. SOURCE: U.S. Department of Justice Read the full article
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varshagahlawat · 1 year
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Signature Global Gurgaon Project is Transforming the Real Estate Landscape
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Signature Global Gurgaon new project is quickly transforming the real estate landscape in the city. Moreover, The project in the Sector 107 area offers residents a range of modern amenities and features unreachable in other parts of the city.
1. What is Signature Global's Gurgaon project?
Signature Global is a well-known real estate company in India. We have many continuous projects across the country. One of their most recent projects is in the city of Gurgaon. It's called the "Gurgaon Project."
The Gurgaon Project is a luxurious residential complex built by Signature Global. We provide many high-end amenities, such as a clubhouse, a swimming pool, and a gym. Moreover, The complex is also prime, close to many of the city's top restaurants and shopping malls.
If you're looking for a luxurious place to call home. Also, The Gurgaon Project is worth considering. Moreover, Signature Global has a well-earned reputation for constructing high-quality homes. Our project is no exception.
2. What are the features of the project?
 The project has the following features: 
-It is a web application. 
-It is a collaborative application. 
-It is a social application. 
-It is a dynamic application.
3. How is the project transforming the real estate landscape?
The project is having a transformative impact on the real estate landscape. Also, We are making the area more convenient and inviting for businesses and residents. Also, The new development is helping to revitalize the area and spur economic growth.
4. What are the benefits of the project?
The benefits of the project are vast. Some of the key benefits include increased economic activity. Moreover, it Increased tax revenue, job creation, and tourism.
The project will create thousands of jobs during the construction phase and hundreds once operational. Moreover, The increased economic activity will help to boost. The local and provincial economies. Also, the project will generate millions of dollars in tax revenue. This will help to fund essential government programs and services.
The project is also expected to boost tourism. Several people are interested in visiting the area to see the new dam. This will generate economic activity and create jobs in the tourism sector.
The signature Global Gurgaon project indicates the changing dynamics in the city's real estate market. Moreover, With more and more projects like this coming online. Gurgaon is quickly becoming one of India's most desirable places to live.
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dearvicme · 1 year
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Senate Bill Would Give Payroll Tax Relief to Some Small Businesses
The Restaurant Revitalization Tax Credit Act has been reintroduced to provide payroll tax relief to eligible small businesses. Senate Bill Would Give Payroll Tax Relief to Some Small Businesses The new legislation creates a special tax credit that is available to businesses that had previously applied for the Small Business Administration’s Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF) program, but did…
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eug3n362 · 1 year
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THIS IS JOHN FETTERMAN!
THE PHILEDELPHIA CITIZEN REPORTS…
“Fetterman worked to address Braddock’s poverty problem by partnering with organizations and businesses to deliver food to the city’s neediest, which often meant Fetterman driving the trucks himself!
“By negotiating with utility companies, he worked to make sure water, gas and electricity stay on in homes where bill payment was delinquent, especially in extreme weather months. And he even bought houses to keep them from going into foreclosure, while keeping residents in them at low-or-no cost!”…The Philadelphia Citizen
Fetterman had a tough time getting through the debate, but that's to be expected from someone who has just had a stroke just months earlier.
Maybe it was that pressure; or the day or the hour that was especially inauspicious for Fetterman; or maybe it was the prospect of facing down Oz, a TV celebrity doctor who has spent years honing a slick on-air personality. It can be argued that only Dr. Kildare, Dr. Welby, and Dr. Phil have more experience in front of a camera than Oz.
Fetterman was not the same man on Tuesday that he was earlier in the month when he took questions from the PennLive-Patriot News of Harrisburg editorial board. (You can watch the hour-long exchange on your laptop or other device.)
The editorial board discussion cast Fetterman in a different light. For sure, his ability to process the spoken word, both giving and receiving, was still compromised. He still stumbled, but the stumbling was hardly a handicap in getting across what he wanted to say.
He was actually eloquent at times. He was asked, right off the bat, why he was running for the Senate. He answered by referring back to his early days in struggling Braddock, as a young man fresh from Harvard and the Kennedy School of Government. (Fetterman grew up well-off in York County, where his father built and operated a successful insurance agency.)
"I think," Fetterman said, "you can best determine what your values are by where you choose to spend your life and your career. I came to Braddock. I came to run a GED program" for high school dropouts.
"There's no money in that," he continued, "there's no glamor. It was a commitment to make sure that people had the opportunity to get their education back on track."
Fetterman stayed on in Braddock, eventually running for mayor, a job with barely a salary and precious little power or responsibility. He formed a non-profit, Braddock Redux, to fund the projects that he hoped would lead to the revitalization of the beleaguered steel town.
According to a recent article in the Washington Post, Fetterman's attempts garnered fans in the predominantly African-American Braddock. He virtually ignored the town council in favor of his non-profit. His vision included artists' lofts and a hipster restaurant.
His "go-it-alone" operational mode hardly endeared him to a segment of Braddock's political establishment, the Post article makes clear.
But the fact that he was elected three times suggests a majority supported his valiant efforts.
Meanwhile, Oz turned from the full-time practice of medicine to hosting a daytime television show that was notorious for peddling miracle cures. Oz became a medical huckster, a TV quack.
In the opening moments of Tuesday's debate, Fetterman alluded to the fact that he wanted to represent in the Senate his fellow-citizens who have been knocked down and are struggling to get back up, mirroring his own recovery from a stroke in the struggles of ordinary Pennsylvanians.
DR. OZ, A TRUMP ENDORSED NEW JERSEY PUPPET PROPPED UP STOOGE RUNNING AGAINST A BORN AND RAISED HUMANITARIAN IN PENNSYLVANIA HOPING TO SECURE A REPUBLICAN MAJORITY IN THE SENATE TO ENABLE HIM AND OTHER REPUBLICANS AS SEN. RON JOHNSON OF WISONSIN RUNNING FOR RE-ELECTION, GOV. GREG ABBOTT AND CRUZ OF TEXAS AND GOV. RON DeSANTIS OF FLORIDA DETERMINED TO CONTINUE AND PURSUE THEIR WAR AGAINST CITIZENS TO CUT THEIR SOCIAL SECURITY, MEDICARE AND MEDICAID, WOMEN’S RIGHTS, VOTER’S RIGHTS AFFECTING SENIORS, DISABLED CITIZENS, BLACKS, HISPANICS, ASIANS, NATIVE AMERICANS AND REST OF THE MINORITIES AS THEY HAVE ALREADY DONE IN REPUBLICAN CONTROLLED STATES AS TEXAS AND FLORIDA WIDELY REPORTED AND CONDEMNED IN THE MEDIA HERE AT HOME AND ALL OVER THE WORLD COMPARING THEIR ACTIONS TO THE THIRD WORLD DICTATORS!!!
John Fetterman has served Pennsylvania with dedication, honor, philanthropy and one can rest assured that he would serve in the best interest of all Philadelphians and particularly the women when this Trump propped up Mehmet Oz has declared that the Right to their bodies and reproductive organs should be determined by the woman, doctor and “THE POLITICAL LEADERS” in their states who happen to be mostly men IRRESPECTIVE Of how that affects that woman’s life leaving her to the mercy of politicians in power who are mostly men!
AS PENNSYLVANIANS, VOTE FOR THE PENNSYLVANIAN WHO HAS STOOD BY THOSE IN NEED AT THE WORST TIME IN THEIR LIVES AND WHO WILL STAND BY YOU THAN AN OUTSIDER PROPPED UP BY POLITICAL SELF, CORPORATE AND PARTY SERVING CARPETBAGGERS WHO ARE LEAST INTERESED IN YOUR WELFARE OR THAT OF YOUR STATE EXCEPT THE POWER THEY HOPE TO GAIN THAT THEY USE AGAINST YOU AS THEY HAVE DONE WITH WOMEN’S AND VOTER’S RIGHTS ACROSS THE NATION!
FETTERMAN IS PENNSYLVANIA … WITH OR WITHOUT A STROKE!
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VOTE FOR PENNSYLVANIA!
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ledenews · 15 days
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