Clint Donaldson and Andrew Jenkins, makers of IcyBreeze, do a presentation as they compete in the TCC StartUp Cup on Thursday. IcyBreeze is a modern multi-use portable cooler and air conditioner single unit that simultaneously keeps beverages and people chilled. MIKE SIMONS / Tulsa World
Tulsa metro foreclosures drop; attention on rates
Foreclosures in the Tulsa metro area, as well as the state and the nation, continued to drop steadily in August, leaving at least one industry expert to worry about other things such as the interest rate, which is creeping toward 5 percent.
According to RealtyTrac Inc., 378 homes in the seven-county Tulsa metro area were in some stage of default, auction or bank repossession compared to 491 homes in July.
There was one foreclosure for every 1,077 households in the Tulsa metro area, which was down 23 percent from July and down 30 percent from this month last year.
In Tulsa County alone, the foreclosure rate was one in every 904 households, compared to Oklahoma County's even better outlook with one in every 1,922 households.
"Our foreclosure crisis is about over. We're so blessed to be in Oklahoma," said Sheldon Detrick, CEO of Prudential Detrick/Prudential Alliance Realty.
Although foreclosures in Tulsa and Oklahoma City markets are improving and the number of foreclosures in the state are the lowest they've been since June 2007, Detrick expressed concern about buyer activity and the number of open houses, which he said have dropped off significantly for the past three weeks.
"The continual rise in interest rates is having a real slow-down effect on the market, and I think this is a foreshadowing of things to come," he said. "Nobody is projecting it to go down. Everybody is projecting it's going to go up."
- SUSAN HYLTON, World Business Writer
TU unveils Friends of Finance speaker series list
Now in its 29th year, the University of Tulsa's Executive Speaker series once again has lined up a wide-ranging slate of monthly speakers September through April.
This annual series kicks off on Sept. 19 with Lawrence Leibowitz, chief operating officer of NYSE Euronext. He will be one of eight featured speakers over the next eight months who will share knowledge and explore important business issues.
"We try for diversity across industries. We also try for diversity - ethnic and gender diversity. Sometimes that is hard. We look for people at the top of companies, usually CEOs, sometimes chief operating officers or chief financial officers," said J. Markham Collins, TU faculty director of Friends of Finance.
Most of the speakers know people in Tulsa and come because they have a connection here, Collins said. TU does not compensate speakers.
In the past 2 1/2 to three years, the luncheon presentations have been sell-outs, attracting more than 400 people who gather in TU's Allen Chapman Activity Center.
Friends of Finance started in 1985 when three TU alumni - Bob Prince, Bruce Currie and Bob Harrison - and two TU faculty members - Collins and Roger Bey - met to discuss how support could be gained for the TU finance department and how it could better serve TU's alumni and the Tulsa business community.
The team soon launched the program's signature event, the Friends of Finance lecture series, which over the years has included a prestigious list of speakers, including Jamie Dimon, the current CEO of JPMorgan Chase who was CEO of Bank One when he spoke here; Richard Fuld Jr., the final chairman and CEO of Lehman Brothers; Kenneth Lewis, former president and CEO of Bank of America; and H. Lee Scott Jr., who then headed up Wal-Mart Stores Inc., to name a few.
- LAURIE WINSLOW, World Business Writer
Public meetings set to discuss Enbridge pipeline
Residents in the path of Enbridge Energy Co.'s crude oil pipeline running through northeastern Oklahoma will get to have their say soon while the Canadian firm plans for construction to start next month.
Public hearings are scheduled in Drumright and Pawhuska next week to discuss the final Oklahoma leg of the Flanagan South pipeline, which will travel from terminals near Chicago to the Cushing oil hub. The 36-inch, 600-mile Flanagan South will run Canadian oil sands and northern U.S. crude.
Meetings are set for 5-7:30 p.m. Monday at Central Tech Pipeline & Safety Center in Drumright and 5-7:30 p.m. Tuesday at Pawhuska Business Center in Pawhuska.
It will run mostly adjacent to the company's existing 22-to-24-inch Spearhead Pipeline. Together the pipelines will have a capacity to transport 775,000 barrels a day of sweet crude from the Bakken formation in Montana and North Dakota and the oil sands of western Canada once complete in mid-2014.
U.S. Pipeline and Westwood Survey were awarded the construction contract that includes Oklahoma and Kansas. Enbridge spokeswoman Katie Lange said that the unions will hire about 40 percent to 50 percent of the workforce locally. At peak, there could be anywhere from 400 to 700 total workers.
So far, Lange said about 70 to 80 workers will come from the Osage Nation but that more will be hired later as work continues.
- SUSAN HYLTON, World Business Writer
The week in numbers
600
Length, in miles, of a proposed pipeline by Enbridge Energy Co. to run from Flanagan, Ill., to Cushing. The pipeline will transport Canadian oil sands and northern U.S. crude.
51
Number of jobs Dish Network will eliminate when it closes its Tulsa Regional Resource Center. The move affects technician dispatchers and will not affect its call center at 71st and Lewis that employs 600 people.
18
Total, in millions, of vehicles of the 800 million worldwide that run on compressed natural gas. The 2014 Ford F-150 will soon be the first half-ton available that will have the option of running on CNG.
Quotable
"It was a very strange day. It changed the whole way we did things at the airport. Within a couple of days there were security at the curb with mirrors to check underneath cars."
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Victor Latimer, owners of a skycap service at Tulsa International Airport, on his memory of what changed following the Sept. 11 attacks 12 years ago.
FYI
The TCC StartUp Cup's search for entrepreneurial excellence narrowed its scope to six finalists Tuesday.
John Chandler, chief financial officer of Magellan Midstream Partners LP, will leave the partnership at the end of March, the Tulsa-based company announced Tuesday.
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