Bay Area homeowners seeking to avoid foreclosure are invited to be part of a studio audience Sunday at KTEH in San Jose as the public television station devotes a live program to addressing the problems of those in trouble with their mortgages.
The one-hour "Facing the Mortgage Crisis" program will include panelists who are experts in helping homeowners seek alternatives to foreclosure and who know the implications for renters of a landlord's foreclosure.
The show will be broadcast live at 6 p.m. Sunday on KTEH (Ch. 10) and re-aired in the ensuing weeks on Northern California public television stations.
Members of the live audience will be asked to submit their specific questions in advance. To sign up to attend the show, Bay Area homeowners, renters and other interested residents should e-mail Lyn Johnson of KTEH at ljohnson@kteh.org or call 415-553-2288.
"Our goal is to connect people to the information they need to get through this," said Becca King Reed, executive producer of KTEH. But she added that one challenge homeowners face is that "the information keeps changing." Sunday's program will offer up-to-date information from local experts who work on foreclosure-prevention efforts every day, she said.
A phone bank of financial and legal counselors will also be on hand to answer questions from the television audience during the show, and for an hour afterward, Reed said.
Homeowners and others with questions about the mortgage crisis or avoiding foreclosure can also address their questions to experts via a blog on the KTEH Web site (www.kteh.org).
Panelists for Sunday's show include Maeve Elise Brown, executive director of Housing and Economic Rights Advocates, based in Oakland and serving all of California; Martin Eichner, director of the housing counseling program at Project Sentinel, which has several offices throughout Northern California; Cheryl Mehe'ula, board member of the Silicon Valley chapter of the California Association of Mortgage Brokers; Anna Elizabeth Reynoso, who supervises the housing counseling staff at Neighborhood Housing Services Silicon Valley; and Kevin Stein, associate director of the California Reinvestment Coalition, an organization whose efforts include fighting unfair mortgage lending practices.
Among KTEH's partners in producing the "Facing the Mortgage Crisis" project are the Mercury News, United Way Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley Community Foundation, Univision and KTSF (Ch. 26).
Attending the Live Show
To attend the live broadcast of "Facing the Mortgage Crisis" at public television station KTEH in San Jose on Sunday evening, e-mail Lyn Johnson at ljohnson@kteh.org, or call 415-553-2288.
Mortgage Crisis Resources
The following organizations provide help to those facing foreclosure. A fuller list is at www.kteh.org.
City of San Jose Foreclosure Help: (408) 794-1242 or www.foreclosurehelpscc.org.
Neighborhood Housing Services Silicon Valley: (408) 279-2600 or www.nhssv.org.
Project Sentinel, Sunnyvale: (408) 720-9888 or www.housing.org.
Project Sentinel, Palo Alto: (888) 331-3332 or www.housing.org.
Project Sentinel, Gilroy: (408) 842-7740 or www.housing.org.
Santa Clara County District Attorney"s Office Real Estate Fraud Unit: (408) 792-2639 or e-mail webmaster@da.co.scl.ca.us