(Over a recent lunch, an executive for a state wide bank mentioned  the national  fall off in loan demands and also that consumer debt was also shrinking.  He attributed it to “Too much uncertainty.”   Neither bode well for recovery of the economy.)

THE MORNING CALL:

The nation’s historic drop in loan volumes in 2009 didn’t miss the Lehigh Valley, with some of the region’s largest banks that received hundreds of millions of dollars in federal investment reporting year-over-year declines in lending from 2008 to 2009.

Construction lending led the downward slide due to the floundering real estate market, local lenders say. The absence of speculative real estate investing –– where developers buy tracts of land and subdivide them into residential lots –– all but vanished in 2009, dragging down loan gains banks made in other sectors.

Other factors decreasing loan volume are declining property and equipment values and shrinking business inventories, which are all used as collateral against loans. When property used to secure a loan is worth less or business inventories used as collateral are depleted, banks can’t lend as much against them, local lenders say.

Click here to read the full article.

PHILADELPHIA DAILY NEWS:

Philadelphia animal-cruelty officers say six Lancaster County breeders sold sick, defective dogs at an Ohio auction last October and should be prosecuted for animal abuse.

The breeders say the investigators fabricated phony abuse in a stunt to fan media attention and spur donations from pet-lovers.

A judge will decide who’s right, because the breeders have filed a federal lawsuit against the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty Against Animals (PSPCA) and Main Line Animal Rescue.

Click here to read more.

An article headed “Fry may leave Franklin & Marshall College for Drexel” reports, “F&M’s 49-year-old president is one of two finalists for the top job at the downtown Philadelphia university of about 22,000 students. The identity of the other finalist is not known.”

WATCHDOG: John Fry has a way of doing the best possible things in the worst possible ways. (Witness his rolling over the reasonable requests of neighbors concerning the relocation of the Norfolk &  Southern railyard and the ‘mugging’ of reporter Ron Harper across the street from Fry’s home by F&M security personnel while Fry looked on. Harper was released without charges and may yet bring suit for false arrest and assault and battery.)

We wish him good luck in his candidacy.

From the PATRIOT NEWS:

…Analysts who handicap the betting on Wall Street said the payoff will depend upon casinos’ ability to attract higher-end gamblers who typically drive table game profits. And they predicted there will be a wide gulf between table game winners and losers among casinos across the state…

Speaking at a two-day conference of gaming industry officials in King of Prussia on Tuesday, the five-member panel of Wall Street analysts cited the need for more amenities, such as fancy restaurants, luxury hotels and top-notch show-business talent, to attract high rollers to poker and blackjack tables…

Click here to read the full article.

In December 2009, County Commissioner Scott Martin told NewsLanc that, in his opinion, the board of commissioners should consider cutting the annual urban enhancement fund for 2010, citing an already-strapped County budget and as-yet-unspent allocations from previous years. At the Wednesday, February 24 commissioners meeting, Martin maintained that position by voting against the $2 million program for 2010.

Commissioners Craig Lehman and Dennis Stuckey both voted in favor of the motion, noting that the reduced allocation, the smaller project match rate, and the tightened guidelines for 2010 show a sufficient response to the County’s financial challenges.

The urban enhancement program allocates sizable grants to county municipalities with the purpose of “sustaining the urban areas of Lancaster County to accommodate growth.” In 2009, the County handed out grants totaling $2.5 million. The allocations ranged from highly practical uses, such as sewer system upgrades or handicapped accessibility improvements, to more questionable ones, such as $20,000 for a Lancaster City streetcar feasibility study.

Martin said that, having seen County employees face layoffs and stagnant incomes, he felt compelled to resist this measure of discretionary spending.

“Though, obviously, what can be used in capital dollars versus what’s used in operational dollars can vary, at the end of the day, what you borrow impacts your general fund,” Martin asserted, “If we keep borrowing at the rate that we’re borrowing, we’re looking at a 14% increase in our debt service next year. And, if you look at any other thing that we’re doing here at County government, there’s not another thing that has increased by 14%.”

Martin also gave the sole dissenting vote regarding a measure to grant $475,000 to the Lancaster County Conservancy for its on-going effort to secure an 870-acre nature preserve and recreation area in the Welsh Mountains.

Over $180k saved with discount drug cards

Also at the Wednesday meeting, Angela Eichelberger, coordinator of the Lancaster County Prescription Drug Discount Program, presented the accomplishments of the effort in its first seven months. Since it’s introduction, the program has saved county residents $186,302.27 on prescription medications not covered by their insurance.

The cards are available free of charge to county residents at a variety of locations, including county offices, municipalities, libraries, community centers, and pharmacies. To benefit from the savings—an average of 22% off—residents need only present the card at a participating pharmacy.

The free program is administered by CVS/Caremark and available to all members of the National Association of Counties (NACo). Participating local pharmacies can be located here through the NACo website.

Give the Japanese credit.  As part of their culture, their leaders are expected to acknowledge mistakes, apologize, and then go on to do better.

When Knight-Ridder owned the Wilkes-Barre Times-Leader and the newspaper lost its way in slanting its coverage to favor plans for an arena as a run up to a referendum, the publisher was replaced and the newspaper published a front page apology along with a couple of pages of highly critical reader comments.

Rather than being behind us, the distorted Lancaster Newspapers coverage of the Convention Center Project will become more and more an issue as taxpayers are required to fund still more money to cover growing convention center losses and possibly have to make good on the City’s guarantee of the Marriott Hotel bonds.  Each piece of bad news will expand the ill feelings engendered by the Lancaster Newspapers’ fall from grace.

Perhaps Jack Buckwalter will learn from the leaders of Toyota, acknowledge mistakes, apologize, and then move on.  However, this is assuming a lot.  Also LNP may be hesitant to admit any fault until the Molly Henderson liable suit against them is resolved.

FINANCIAL TIMES:

Akio Toyoda, the embattled Toyota chief executive, has admitted that the company lost its way and its sense of priorities in its rapid rise to the top, culminating in a massive vehicle recall and a loss of consumer trust…

While safety used to be the company’s top priority, followed by quality and volume, the chief executive acknowledges that those priorities became “confused” in the expansion of its business. “We pursued growth over the speed at which we were able to develop our people and our organisation, and we should sincerely be mindful of that,” Mr Toyoda’s testimony says…

Click here to read the full article.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

…Last February Congress approved a $787 billion economic recovery program, $26.8 billion of which was allocated for Pennsylvania projects and residents. Although the state is still coping with an 8.9 percent unemployment rate, it is not for lack of investment by the federal government…

The state Department of General Services reports that $11 billion was paid to state residents in tax benefits; $13.5 billion was routed through state agencies for highway construction, school improvement, clean energy and other projects; and the remainder went to local governments or federal programs that support universities, fix locks and dams, improve housing or help businesses. All told, the dollars in Pennsylvania have translated into 12,000 jobs so far…

Click here to read the full article.

USATODAY:

Home prices rose in December for the seventh month in a row, but more foreclosures are expected to pull down prices later this year.

Seasonally adjusted home prices in 20 major metro areas rose 0.3% in December compared with November, according to the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller Home Price Index. Fourteen cities showed higher prices than in November on a seasonally adjusted basis.

Click here to read the full article.

From “Clash of privacy, students’ laptops”:

“Now there’s this word from a suburban Philadelphia school district, where officials admit they remotely activated the webcams to find missing laptops and nothing more.  But at least one student has his doubt…[Blake] Robbins learned he was photographed when an assistant principal approached him and accused him of engaging in improper behavior at home…

“The school district should shut down the webcams for good and look to some other, less intrusive technology to keep tabs o laptops.  Big Brother may not like it, but it’s the right thing to do.”

WATCHDOG: Two good ones in a row for the New Era, approaching a record!  A wag of the tail.