SACRAMENTO, Calif. — William S. Haraf, California Commissioner of Financial Institutions, made a formal request to DFI licensees today: help stop the spread of the West Nile Virus. The mosquito-spread disease is advancing at a rapid pace in California, thanks in part to swimming pools on empty, foreclosed properties that serve as breeding grounds.
Starting tomorrow, the Sacramento-Yolo Mosquito and Vector Control District will aerially treat approximately 23,000 acres of South Sacramento for adult mosquitoes for three consecutive nights. Governor Schwarzenegger previously declared a state of emergency last August for counties hit hardest by West Nile Virus. So far in 2008, California has recorded two human cases of the virus, with 25 counties reporting positive hits among tested mosquitoes, birds and mammals.
In a letter to DFI stakeholders and other financial services providers, Haraf told them to drain pools located in vacant homes or on properties for which they are responsible, or keep them properly maintained and mosquito free.
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SB 1137, signed into law last Tuesday, requires the legal owner to maintain vacant residential property purchased at a foreclosure sale or acquired through foreclosure, and provides for civil fines of up to $1,000 per day for failure to maintain the property.
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