Two Louisiana banks — Citizens Bank & Trust Company in Covington and Patterson State Bank — are among nearly three dozen nationwide that have opted not to pay dividends to the U.S. Treasury Department’s Capital Purchase Program, part the fed’s Troubled Asset Relief Program, widely known as “the bank bailout.” The number of financial institutions that chose not to pay dividends on the federal investment jumped from 19 in the second quarter to 34 in the third quarter, which represents 5 percent of the 646 banks and thrifts that received CPP funds.
According to bank research firm SNL Financial, Citizens Bank & Trust, with total assets of $125 million, was loaned $2.4 million in CPP funds earlier this year. As of August, it had made $20,000 in dividend payments. Patterson State Bank ($226 million in total assets) has also payed only $20,000 in dividends on its $3.7 million TARP infusion.
Ninety-eight banks have failed this year, and the escalating number of banks not paying their TARP dividends is, according to some analysts, an ominous sign. Matthew Wurtzel at thedeal.com writes:
[I]f banks are skipping the payments to preserve capital as seems to be the excuse, what does that say about their health? Wasn’t the Treasury supposed to review their health before giving them money? It would be interesting to see if there were any TARP recipients now on the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.’s troubled bank list. However, we’ll likely never know because the FDIC keeps that list under lock and key out of fear that publishing it would prompt runs on banks.
David Calhoun and Elizabeth “EB” Brooks are the first two employees of Lafayette Central Park Inc., the nonprofit charged with turning Lafayette Consolidated Government’s 100-acre Johnston Street Horse Farm property into a passive public park. Calhoun was named executive director, and Brooks is director of planning and design.
Is it a crime for citizens to photograph, video, or take notes of a police officer in the line of duty, or a right protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution? Locally, such activity, as witnessed recently, will at the very least result in a night spent behind bars.
At Thursday's State of the Economy luncheon, LEDA President and CEO Gregg Gothreaux said PXP has already quietly hired 180 people for its Broussard expansion.
There will soon be a whole lot of shakin’ going on at Benny’s Sportshack Supplement Depot, a new concept by Opelousas native Benny Nele. Located at 2002 Johnston St., the supplement shop, smoothie bar and café, featuring hot off the press paninis and wraps, plans to open in late May.
This year’s Cool Town issue is all about people who are not native to South Louisiana but made a conscious decision to be here, to be among us, to participate in our culture and contribute to it.
A shelved ordinance transferring $200,000 from a northside drainage project to a south Lafayette development may not break any laws, but it stinks to high heaven.
An effort to restore a shuttered dancehall and document other vacant or razed honky-tonks could serve as a model for saving an endangered species of entertainment.
Lafayette’s gene pool has been host to a long line of eccentric characters who have blurred the lines between crazy, genius, disturbed and curiously entertaining.
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