Cal-Neva Conference

Jamie Woo and Audrey Perrott of the Consumer Action outreach staff attended the Cal-Neva Conference at the Sir Francis Drake Hotel in San Francisco. The event was co-sponsored by Mutual of America, Nonprofits United, The HeatSmart Campaign, Heffernan Insurance, Public Health Institute and Consumer Action. Assemblywoman Fiona Ma was in attendance as well as other elected officials and a complete delegation of federal employees, who gave presentations on the last day. Perrott notes, "It was a great event with about 80 participants." The topics discussed included:

• the best practices of developing partnerships with local government agencies
• the state of poverty in California and its impact on the federal and state budgets
• the impact of the mortgage crisis
• the need for more financial literacy programs for both low and moderate income individuals and families
• best practices for partnering with federal agencies
• the epidemic of human trafficking in the US and abroad
• the varying levels of readiness for disaster preparedness
• the need for innovative prisoner re-entry programs that increase opportunities for success and decrease chances of recidivism
• discussions of key proposed state and federal legislation relating to foreclosure reform
• bankruptcy law reform
• health care and anti-poverty initiatives

There were many opportunities to network during the conference. The organizers allowed participants time to mingle, exchange business cards and discuss action planning for individual agencies. The Consumer Action representatives spoke with Community Action Agencies, corporations, Assemblywoman Ma, Scott Silverman, Executive Director and founder of Second Chance, Paul Leonard of Center for Responsible Lending and Senior Policy Analyst Scott Graves from the California Budget Project. Consumer Action had a booth at the event. The most popular Consumer Action publications were Banking Basics, Keys to Homeownership, Personal Bankruptcy and Rebuilding Good Credit and True Stories, a predatory-lending novella. The languages requested were English, Spanish, Chinese and Hmong. Consumer Action has received help with Hmong translation from organizations advocating for Hmong residents in the Sacramento and Stockton areas.