Local-Food Entrepreneurs bring Produce directly to Eaters

Lexington Herald-Leader

RALEIGH, N.C. - "From farm to fork" has long been the rallying cry of the eat-local movement.

But getting the food from the farm has been a barrier for some consumers who don't have time to shop at farmers markets or who find community-supported agriculture programs, better known as CSAs, inconvenient.

Enter a new breed of business - a middleman between consumers and farmers - that tweaks the old model.

Traditionally, a consumer who joins a farmer's CSA pays up to $600 in the winter for a weekly share of produce from spring to fall. Though the programs are popular - there are more than 100 in North Carolina, up from 35 in 2002 - many people cannot pay for a whole season of produce in advance, volunteer on a farm or pick up the food at designated times as many programs require. Other people simply don't know what to do with an abundance of beets or kale.

That has created an opportunity for businesses such as Papa Spuds and The Produce Box, which allow customers to pay for their produce as they go - generally $20 to $30 per box. They offer customers more choice and generally stock products from several farms rather than just one. In addition, the boxes are delivered to customers' homes.

These new businesses are bringing hundreds of new customers to the table, helping to make farming financially viable for more small farmers.

In two years, The Produce Box has grown from 25 customers to nearly 3,000. At the end of last season, the Raleigh company was filling 900 boxes a week, and owner Courtney Tellefsen said demand is growing steadily this year. Some areas have a waiting list to become a Produce Box customer.

This type of system has been feasible only for a few years, said Rob Meyer, co-founder of Papa Spuds, a similar operation in Cary, N.C. He credits his partnership with Eastern Carolina Organics, a Pittsboro, N.C., group that acts as a distributor for local organic products.

Meyer's company, which offers meat and produce, also contracts directly with dozens of farms throughout the state to get the volume and variety customers demand.

"If you were going to do local organic in our size in this area, there aren't enough farms," he said.

Sandi Kronick, CEO of Eastern Carolina Organics, said the new businesses complement farmers' other efforts to reach consumers. Eastern Carolina Organics is farmer-owned and distributes organic products from farmers to restaurants, retailers and companies such as Papa Spuds.

"CSAs are overbooked by February, and there's always going to be customers who choose to go pick up off the farm," Kronick said. "The point is that the money is flowing throughout the local community, and hopefully it's resulting in more acres turning into organic in the state."

The Produce Box partners with Lee Farms in Dunn, N.C., where the sorting and packing is done on site, often within hours of the items' being picked. The company then relies on a network of women who do not work outside the home to distribute the boxes throughout the Triangle.

Papa Spuds gets bulk shipments from Eastern Carolina Organics at its Cary warehouse, where everything is packed and then distributed.

"It took us a year to turn a profit," Meyer said. "We bootstrapped the hell out of it at first. We got our feet and hands really dirty."

For customers like Jessica McRackan the new businesses make eating local feasible.

McRackan, 29, of Cary gave birth to a daughter at the end of March, an event that put an end to her regular trips to the farmers market.

"I like it better," she said of the deliveries. "I love the environment of the farmers market; it's a lot of fun. But it's often hot and it's crowded."

McRackan has become such a fan of The Produce Box service that she writes a blog dedicated to sharing what she does with the contents of each box she receives. She posts meal plans and recipes to help others figure out what to do with less familiar produce.

Government Starts Talks about New Mortgage System

Associated Press

Talk of shrinking the government's involvement in the mortgage market is growing. Just don't expect action any time soon.

A conference Tuesday at the Treasury Department is the first of many steps toward restructuring the nearly $11 trillion mortgage market. So far, rescuing mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac has cost the government more than $148 billion. That number is expected to grow.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner pledged "fundamental change" to the structure of Fannie and Freddie, which profited tremendously during good times but burdened taxpayers with losses when the housing market went bust. He said the two companies weren't the only cause of the financial crisis, but made it worse.

Geithner, however, did not offer a specific exit strategy for Fannie and Freddie. He said only that, "it is our responsibility to make sure that we create a system that is not vulnerable to these same failures happening again."

With Republicans likely to pick up seats in Congress in November, however, the Obama administration will need support from both political parties for the changes it proposes.

Reflecting this reality, Geithner said that "the failures that produced the system we have today were bipartisan. The solution must be as well."

Executives and mortgage experts are prepared to tell Obama officials that the government must stay in the business of backing U.S. mortgages even if Fannie and Freddie disappear someday.

"At the end of the day, the government will still have a very large role to play," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics and a panelist at the event. Others include mortgage executives from Bank of America Corp. and Wells Fargo & Co, plus Bill Gross, managing director of bond giant Pimco and Lewis Ranieri, one of the creators of mortgage bonds.

The Obama administration's management of Fannie and Freddie has been under fire for months from Republicans on Capitol Hill. In December, the Treasury Department eliminated a $400 billion cap on how much money it would give the mortgage giants to keep them from failing. Sen. John McCain, R.-Ariz., has called that a "taxpayer-backed slush fund" and called for the support to be wound down.

Many in the mortgage industry say that's not realistic.

"There has to be a game plan," said Paul Leonard, vice president of government affairs at the Housing Policy Council, a mortgage industry group. "You can't just pull the plug on them."

Fannie and Freddie buy mortgages and package them into securities with a guarantee against default. They have ensured that millions of Americans can get home loans - even after the housing market collapsed.

The two mortgage giants, the Federal Housing Administration and the Veterans Administration together backed about 90 percent of loans made in the first half of the year, according to trade publication Inside Mortgage Finance.

At some point the government will have to scale back the level of support it provided the housing and mortgage markets during the recession and financial crisis.

"The government's footprint in the housing market needs to be smaller than it is today," said Shaun Donovan, President Barack Obama's housing secretary.

Most of the plans being circulated to reshape the mortgage market call for the government to guarantee that investors who buy mortgage-backed securities receive their money even if borrowers default.

Under this system, Fannie and Freddie could either be returned to private ownership or phased out completely. Fannie and Freddie, or their replacements, would pay the government to insure the loans. That money could be tapped if the housing market collapses.

"A government guarantee is both a desirable and necessary component of the country's housing finance system," wrote John Gibbons, a Wells Fargo & Co. executive vice president, in a letter last month to the Treasury Department.

Geithner said that there is a "strong case to be made" for such a government guarantee, but said the government needs to charge enough money to make sure the taxpayer does not get hit with losses in the future.

Caterpillar Picks NC for Second Plant in Two Weeks

WRAL

SANFORD, N.C. — Heavy equipment manufacturer Caterpillar Inc. announced an expansion at its Sanford plant on Thursday afternoon, bringing more than 300 jobs back to a facility that has seen cutbacks in recent years.

Gov. Beverly Perdue and other state and local officials were at the plant to herald the $28.3 million expansion, which is expected to add 325 jobs over the next four years. An unidentified Caterpillar supplier is also expected to bring 160 jobs to North Carolina to work with the plant, officials said.

“For the second time in less than a week, Caterpillar is making a major investment in North Carolina and strengthening its ties as a corporate citizen of our state,” Perdue said in a statement. “By expanding its stake in North Carolina, Caterpillar has demonstrated that our own investments in education, worker training, transportation and infrastructure have paid off.”

Last Friday, the company said it would build a $426 million factory in Winston-Salem to produce axle units for large mining equipment. It could employ about 500 full-time and contract workers in five years.

Caterpillar will build a 270,000-square-foot addition to the Sanford plant that will house logistics and robotic welding lines to produce skid steer loaders and other equipment, officials said. About half of the new production is slated for export, they said.

Construction is expected to start in September, with production beginning by next July, officials said. The average annual wage for the new jobs will be $35,602, plus benefits, they said.

The Sanford plant and another Caterpillar facility in Clayton have experienced several rounds of layoffs since late 2008, as the company adjusted to the global economic slowdown.

Lee County's unemployment rate is more than 12 percent, and Sanford Mayor Cornelia Olive said it was difficult for her to stop smiling on Thursday with hundreds of new jobs on the horizon.

"This has been a hard couple years for Lee County," Olive said.

Charles Childress, who lost his job as a machinist five months ago, already lined up an interview for Monday for a job at Caterpillar.

"It's hard to find a job. It really is," Childress said. "I know a lot of people out there need work, and there's a lot of people out there qualified (for the Caterpillar jobs)."

Caterpillar employs 1,026 full-time workers in seven North Carolina counties, and with the economy stabilizing, the Peoria, Ill.-based company appears to be gearing up for growth again.

Lee County commissioners in June offered Caterpillar up to $900,000 in incentives to land the plant expansion.

Caterpillar also was awarded a $600,000 grant from the One North Carolina Fund, which provides cash grants to attract business projects to the state. No money is paid up front, and companies must meet job creation and investment targets to obtain the funding.

Also, the state Economic Investment Committee voted Thursday to award a Job Development Investment Grant to Caterpillar. Under the terms of the JDIG, the company is eligible to receive a grant equal to 75 percent of the state withholding taxes on the new jobs for each year in which it meets annual performance targets.

If Caterpillar meets the all of the targets during an 11-year period, it could garner $3.46 million from the JDIG.

40% of Participants Depart Federal Mortgage Aid Program

USA Today

The number of homeowners dropped from the Obama administration's signature program to modify mortgages for cash-strapped homeowners is larger than the number of those receiving permanently lower monthly payments under the program.

The program puts homeowners into five-year programs with lower monthly payments on their mortgages, but first they must provide proof of income and get through a three-month trial period making all payments on time. About 530,000 homeowners, or about 40% of 1.3 million borrowers enrolled, have had their lower mortgage payments canceled, the Treasury Department reported Tuesday.

An additional 398,000 homeowners, or 30% of borrowers, have received the longer-term lower payments on their mortgages.

To qualify, homeowners must be paying about a third or more of their monthly gross income toward their mortgage. They must have a property value less than about $729,000, and they must have incurred some sort of hardship.

For qualifying homeowners, banks will extend repayment periods, drop interest rates to as low as 2% and, in some cases, reduce the outstanding loan value. Homeowners in the longer-term modifications are guaranteed lower payments for five years, then fixed terms at today's low rates for the life of the loan. The typical homeowner is receiving a reduction in the monthly payment of 36%, or more than $500 a month.

Some economists say few are benefiting from the program. "(It) is not helping a lot of people, but for those that have gotten it, it seems to be working reasonably well," says Mark Zandi at Moody's Analytics. "The problem is not a lot of people are getting it."

Others see progress. The total number of homeowners getting longer-term mortgage modifications increased nearly 15% in June. "The housing market and economy are starting to resolve the issues, thought it's going to take years," says Joel Naroff at Naroff Economic Advisors.

For the first time, the government also detailed how many borrowers with modifications are defaulting for a second time. For homeowners with permanent loan modifications for six months, fewer than 6% are 60 or more days delinquent. Fewer than 3% of such homeowners have defaulted at the nine-month mark.

FeatureTel Named Among Top 100 NC Small Businesses

TMCnet

The Business Leader magazine has recognized FeatureTel, a hosted business VoIP telephone system solutions company in North Carolina as a Top 100 North Carolina Small Business for 2010.

Business Leader provides information, tools, and resources for business executives/owners. The magazine is found on newsstands worldwide with local editions available in certain markets.FeatureTel ( News - Alert) is a fully managed and Hosted VoIP, voice and data communications service company. The company provides businesses across the Carolinas with a cost-effective, feature-rich alternative to traditional voice communication solutions.

FeatureTel earned this recognition mainly because of its implementation of a new telephone service with upgraded functionality for the City of Durham, the establishment of its Channel Partner (News - Alert) program, and its community service. Apart from sponsoring events to benefit Hospice of Wake County, Habitat for Humanity and breast cancer research, FeatureTel provides free phone service to the Triangle Autism Society.

“We are pleased to have been recognized with this award for our business achievements,” said FeatureTel Founder and CEO Paul Levering (News - Alert), “but we are especially proud of our community involvement and what we do to give back.” Levering, a supporter of educational concerns, personally participated as a panelist at the North Carolina School of Science and Math Alumni Forum & Lecture Series last year.

The list of Top 100 North Carolina Small Businesses from Business Leader includes companies with 100 employees or less that do the majority of their business in North Carolina. During the selection process, Business Leader evaluated each company's one-year and five-year revenue growth, business achievements and community involvement. FeatureTel was honored June 24 at an awards dinner in Raleigh real estate, N.C.

In October 2009, the company announced that it recently completed the installation of phones and related services for 1,815 users across the City of Durham’s operations, including police and fire rescue. This is deployment is part of a $1.63 million contract that also includes network equipment upgrades and a three-year service agreement. The previous telephone system of the city required 67 different key systems.

Many Cities Across U.S. Issuing More Housing Permits than during Boom

Reed Construction Data

Des Moines, Charleston, Austin, Columbia and Houston are the strongest large metro housing markets. These are the only cities with a population over 500,000 that issued permits/1000 population at more than three times the national pace over the last year.

Twenty-four smaller cities also had intense housing development at a rate per 1000 population more than three times the national average. This set includes two cities rebuilding from hurricane destruction of homes, several college towns and military base cities, resort and retirement cities in North Carolina and the Rocky Mountains and three market center cities in the Plains states. Several of the resort/retirement cities were part of the 2004-06 housing boom but the rest of the twenty-four cities sat out the boom so they have relatively minor foreclosure and underwater mortgage problems now.

The four large Texas metro areas continue to dominate the list of the largest single family housing markets. Together, they account for nearly 37% of the permits over the last year among the twenty cities issuing the most permits. Las Vegas, Phoenix, Riverside, Tampa, Austin, San Antonio and Orlando are the only housing boom cities still left on the top twenty list. Washington has moved up to third place on the strength of tens of thousands of new federal jobs. Atlanta, the largest housing market for several years has dropped to 7th place due to a weak Georgia economy and a large surplus of unsold homes. Fifteen metro areas, all manufacturing centers without any of today’s high growth industries, have issued less than two permits a month over the last year. Sandusky Ohio has issued no permits and Wheeling West Virginia has issued only one permit.

New York City remains by far the largest multi family permit metro. The recent credit based recession caused much less damage to the New York City economy than expected. Construction activity remains relatively strong partly due to the mild recession and partly because the permitting process is so long and so expensive that developers are always in a catch up mode. Permits are up from a year ago in many college and oil patch towns that escaped both the 2005-06 housing boom and the worst of the ongoing economic recession. San Francisco has returned to the list of top multi family markets due to hiring by its growing technology industries. Other markets that have recently become significant are Salt Lake City (low cost attracts new jobs and residents) and Virginia Beach (a lower cost alternative to South Florida).

Forty-five cities issued more housing permits in the three months ending in March than they did at the peak of the housing boom in late 2005/early 2006. All of these cities are very small markets except for El Paso, Buffalo and Rochester. This should not be interpreted as a list of cities leading the housing market or the economy out of recession. These cities simply missed most of the recession as they did the previous housing boom. Many of them have a locally unique housing demand driver. In El Paso, it is immigration. In Bismarck and Grand Forks, it is a strong farm economy.

Atlanta and Phoenix continue to have the largest declines in homebuilding relative to the peak of the housing boom. The twenty cities on the list are all suffering from the surplus supply created during several years of overbuilding, as with Houston apartments. Excepting, New York City, each of them has an unusually large inventory of homes for sale and a high incidence of foreclosures and underwater mortgages that will keep inventory excessive well into next year and possibly beyond in Florida and the Rocky Mountains.

IBM To Hire 600 Workers In RTP For Service Center

Raleigh Telegram

North Carolina Governor Beverly Perdue announced this week that a subsidiary of IBM (International Business Machines) will hire around 600 workers during the next two years in Research Triangle Park.

The governor’s office says that the company will invest $3.7 million to open a managed business process service center in Research Triangle Park.  The jobs are being located here thanks in part to tax incentives being offered by state and local governments that could total as high as $7.79 million if IBM hires all of the 600 workers.

“IBM has been a major employer in North Carolina providing thousands of skilled jobs for more than 30 years. We value this company’s ongoing commitment to North Carolina and Research Triangle Park,” said Perdue.

With thousands of workers, IBM is one of the largest employers in Research Triangle Park and one of its first tenants in the facility that was created by the government decades ago to draw high-tech firms to the area.

According to the governor’s office, the salaries for the 600 new jobs will be around $50,000 a year, while the Durham County real estate average is $57,772.

“The new services operation furthers our commitment to the state of North Carolina and our ongoing presence in Research Triangle Park,” said Bob Greenberg, senior state executive, IBM North Carolina in a released statement.

“These are exactly the sort of highly skilled jobs that North Carolina needs to be recruiting in the 21st century economy, and we’re especially pleased that IBM is expanding its presence in Research Triangle Park,” said Rep. Mickey Michaux, (D-Durham) in a released statement.