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Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 28, 2010 at 2:17am

(Former L.A. County Labor Leader Investigated)


Probe focuses on $150,000 in consulting fees paid by one ex-SEIU official to another to under a confidential agreement, sources say.

Investigators are said to be questioning labor officers about payments to Alejandro Stephens. (Gary Friedman, Los Angeles Times / September 28, 2010)








As part of a lengthy corruption investigation, federal authorities have been examining $150,000 in consulting fees paid to a disgraced former Los Angeles labor leader under a confidential agreement signed by Andy Stern, then president of the powerful Service Employees International Union, according to documents and interviews.


The U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles had considered filing embezzlement charges against Alejandro Stephens, who headed the SEIU local for county government workers, in connection with the payments, records obtained by The Times show.


Prosecutors decided last year not to include the embezzlement counts in a criminal complaint against Stephens, who is going to prison on other charges, but investigators were still questioning labor officers about the payments at least nine months later, say three people familiar with the probe. They spoke on condition of anonymity because of the secretive nature of the federal inquiry.


They say the FBI and U.S. Labor Department investigators are focusing on whether Stern or other SEIU leaders expected Stephens to perform any work for the money, or if they approved what amounted to a no-show job for him.
SEIU spokeswoman Michelle Ringuette declined to answer questions about the agreement. In an e-mail she said, "Alejandro Stephens has had no role or involvement with the union for several years. Stephens violated the terms of his … agreement with the union, and we are aggressively seeking the return of all payments made to him under that agreement."


Stephens, 67, said that he did the work required by the 2007 agreement and that the union still owes him $75,000.


Attempts to reach Stern, who retired last spring and now sits on President Obama's bipartisan deficit-reduction commission, were unsuccessful. Federal officials would not comment.


The 2-million-member SEIU, the nation's second-largest union, has been wracked with allegations of corruption, especially in California. The Times reported in 2008 that another SEIU local in Los Angeles had directed hundreds of thousands of dollars to businesses owned by relatives and associates of its president, Tyrone Freeman, who was subsequently fired.


Federal authorities have since been investigating Freeman and other SEIU officials, according to court records and people close to the inquiry.


While looking into the Stephens agreement, investigators have also sought information about SEIU outlays to other consultants and firms with personal ties to union officers and about a book deal that paid Stern a six-figure advance, say the people with knowledge of the probe.


SEIU helped fact-check and promote Stern's 2006 book, "A Country That Works," and bought it in bulk, union officials have acknowledged. Stern has said that his book contract was entirely proper and that he did not accept royalties from sales to the union.


Legal issues aside, labor experts said such agreements as Stephens' can be troubling, especially when they are confidential.


"It's not transparent, so the union members could not see what's going on with their money," said David Witwer, a professor at Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg, who has written books on labor corruption.


In a separate case, Stephens pleaded guilty to mail fraud and tax evasion involving a labor nonprofit and was sentenced to four months in federal prison. He faced up to 43 years behind bars on those offenses but told The Times that he did not cooperate with the government in exchange for a lighter sentence.


"I'm no fink," Stephens said.


As the Stephens agreement notes, he lost his local presidency after his SEIU chapter was merged into a new one. The deal requires him not to disclose its terms or to say anything disparaging about SEIU.


When The Times learned the first details of the agreement in August 2008, 20 months after Stern signed it, SEIU officials said Stephens had violated its terms by staying on the county payroll. But the four-page agreement does not include a requirement that he give up his county job.


SEIU officials later said that Stephens had not done the work he promised to do.


The agreement calls for Stephens to receive a severance payment of about $77,000 and three annual grants of $75,000 each for the consulting duties, which were defined as "retiree relations and other community programs that support the union's work in Southern California."


Stephens said, "There was no money that was stolen, no money that was embezzled from SEIU. I'm getting screwed while everyone else is out there enjoying themselves. I'm the fall guy."


The Stephens arrangement led to the downfall of another SEIU leader, Annelle Grajeda, his former girlfriend.


Amid questions of whether she used her influence to keep him on the county payroll, Grajeda lost her positions as president of the merged local, head of SEIU's California council and one of the union's six executive vice presidents. More recently, Grajeda, who has denied any wrongdoing, retired as an SEIU staff member, Ringuette said.




paul.pringle@latimes.com

patrick.mcdonnell@latimes.com

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 28, 2010 at 1:32am

(Report: Significant Cheating By FBI Agents On Exam)

WASHINGTON – A Justice Department investigation has found that FBI agents, including several supervisors, cheated on an important test covering the bureau's policies for conducting surveillance on Americans.


Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine said Monday that his limited review of allegations that agents improperly took the open-book test together or had access to an answer sheet has turned up "significant abuses and cheating."


Fine called on the bureau to discipline the agents, throw out the results and come up with a new test to see if FBI agents understand new rules allowing them to conduct surveillance and open files on Americans without evidence of criminal wrongdoing.


The troubling review of the exam on surveillance rules follows Fine's report last week on the FBI's scrutiny of domestic activist groups. That investigation found that the FBI gave inaccurate information to Congress and the public when it claimed a possible terrorism link to justify monitoring an anti-war rally in Pittsburgh in 2002. That IG report also criticized the factual basis for opening or continuing FBI domestic terrorism investigations of some other nonviolent left-leaning groups.


In the inquiry into the exam, the inspector general looked only at four FBI field offices and found enough troubling information to warrant a comprehensive review by the FBI.


In one FBI field office, four agents exploited a computer software flaw "to reveal the answers to the questions as they were taking the exam," Fine said.


Other test-takers used or circulated materials that essentially provided the test answers, he said.


Fine said that almost all of those who cheated "falsely certified" that they did the work themselves, without the help of others.


Last year, Assistant Director Joseph Persichini, the head of the FBI's Washington field office that investigates congressional wrongdoing and other crime in the nation's capital, retired amid a review of test-taking in his office.


Persichini wrote down the answers to the test while two of his most senior managers were in the room taking the exam together, the IG said. Persichini used the answers he had written down to complete the exam another day, the IG added. A legal adviser also was in the room with Persichini and the two agents discussing the questions and possible answers.


Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said he was "especially disheartened that several FBI supervisors cheated on this exam" and the senator called on the FBI to implement "a more trustworthy exam process going forward and hold accountable those responsible for the cheating."


Most FBI employees took the exam between May 2009 and January 2010.


"This report reinforces that the FBI cannot police itself," said Michael German, policy counsel to the American Civil Liberties Union. "There needs to be stronger oversight and stronger controls over the bureau's use of its investigative powers."


German also expressed concern about the surveillance guidelines themselves, saying they enable the targeting of people for investigation when there is "no factual basis to support that speculative belief."


An FBI professional organization said Monday it supported changes to ensure the integrity of future tests.


"We look forward to working with the bureau to develop better procedures to ensure that future exams are conducted in a uniform manner with clear and consistent instruction in all locations," said Konrad Motyka, president of the FBI Agents Association, which has membership of nearly 12,000 active and retired agents.

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 28, 2010 at 1:12am

Atlanta Bishop Eddie Long Denies Accusations Of Sexual Abuse From Male Parishioners

Bishop Long eulogizing at Coretta Scoot King's Funeral

Bishop Long with his Wife

Bishop Long and Ex-President George Bush

Bishop Long and Pastor Bernice King





ATLANTA — The prominent Pastor of a 25,000-member megachurch near Atlanta denies allegations in a lawsuit that he coerced two young men from the congregation into a sexual relationship, his attorney said.


Lawyers for the men, now 20 and 21, say they filed the lawsuit Tuesday in DeKalb County Court against Bishop Eddie Long. The Associated Press generally does not identify people who say they were victims of sexual impropriety.


President George W. Bush and three former Presidents visited the sprawling New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in the Atlanta suburb of Lithonia for the 2006 funeral of Coretta Scott King, the widow of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Long introduced the speakers and the Rev. Bernice King, the Kings' younger daughter, delivered the eulogy. She is also a Pastor there.


The men who filed the suit were 17- and 18-year-old members of the church when they say Long abused his spiritual authority to seduce them with cars, money, clothes, jewelry, international trips and access to celebrities.


Craig Gillen, Long's attorney, says the Pastor "categorically denies the allegations."


"We find it unfortunate that these two young men would take this course of action," Gillen said late Tuesday after news of the lawsuit broke. He said Long had not yet been served with copies of the lawsuits.


Long has called for a national ban on same-sex marriage and his church counsels gay members to become straight. In 2004, he led a march with Bernice King to her father's Atlanta grave to support a national constitutional amendment to protect marriage "between one man and one woman."


He also has released several gospel albums, authored books on relationships and spirituality, and hosts a weekly television program.


B.J. Bernstein, an attorney representing the plaintiffs, said she opened her investigation after getting a call from one of the boys. She said her law office is now broadening the investigation.


"We are taking calls and we do believe, based on what the boys' statements are, that there are other victims," she said.


Although the relationships started when the plaintiffs were past the legal age of consent in Georgia – which is 16 – she said Long abused his "spiritual authority" to coerce her clients into engaging in sexual acts.


Bernstein also said that Bishop made an excessive number of phone calls and e-mails to her clients. She said most of the notes were not crude, but several of them asked the clients to send him pictures. She said she will subpoena Long for his records.


"It's an irrational number of contacts," she said.


When asked about a possible motive for the accusations, Gillen referred to a break-in at Long's office in June. Bernstein said one of the plaintiffs is facing a criminal burglary charge in the incident, but she said the break-in was a way of lashing out at Long.


Bernstein said she contacted the U.S. Attorney's Office earlier this month when she became aware of the young men's allegations. She did not know what action, if any, the agency planned to take. She said she did not contact DeKalb County authorities because Long and his church have strong ties to county officials.


Patrick Crosby, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Atlanta, would not comment on whether federal prosecutors are investigating Long.


A Georgia Bureau of Investigation spokesman John Bankhead said last Wednesday his office wasn't investigating. And Orzy Theus of the DeKalb County District Attorney's office said last Wednesday that county prosecutors do not plan to be involved.


"That's a civil matter. They were over the age of consent, that's not a criminal matter," said Theus.


Long was appointed Pastor of New Birth in 1987. Then, the church had about 150 members. Less than four years later, the church had grown to more than 8,000 members. Athletes and entertainers claim membership at the church.


Long's church was among those named in 2007 in a Senate committee's investigation into a half-dozen Christian ministries over their financing.


Today, New Birth sits on 250 acres and has more than 25,000 members, a $50 million, 10,000-seat cathedral and more than 40 ministries – including the Longfellows Youth Academy, a tuition-based program for young men 13 to 18.


The New Birth campus was quiet last Wednesday morning, with no unusual activity. Administrative staff referred media inquiries to Long's spokesman and people at the church declined to comment on the situation.

Comment by Edmund Stevens on September 25, 2010 at 9:06pm

Nice article. This "NEW" Project sounds like a great one!

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 25, 2010 at 8:42pm

New Facility Highlights Black Worker Center's Mission

Volunteers help fix up the Black Worker Center in the Paul Robeson Community Center. (Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times / September 24, 2010)






Program seeks to reverse unemployment and loss of traditional employers by helping African Americans get construction jobs.


Beads of sweat dotted Terrence Mason Jr.'s forehead Saturday morning as he brushed white primer on a metal pipe outside the faded South Los Angeles building that houses the Los Angeles Black Worker Center.


Mason, a sheet metal worker, was among dozens of electricians, painters and other construction workers who showed up in work boots and hard hats, tool belts strapped around their hips, to lend their skills to fixing up the center's new headquarters in the Paul Robeson Community Center on South Vermont Avenue.


The occasion was a "day of service and community" to spotlight a fledgling movement aimed at promoting local hiring policies that create career construction jobs for black workers.


"We're fighting to reverse the black job crisis," said Lola Smallwood Cuevas, project director of the UCLA Downtown Labor Center and a creator of the Black Worker Center, where the mission is to study and highlight the needs of African Americans in the Los Angeles labor market. Landlord Oneil Cannon, 93, offered a year's free rent in exchange for renovations.


There was a time when African Americans in Southern California could find jobs in aerospace, automaking and other industries that could boost their families into the middle class. But by 1985, many of those jobs, along with janitorial and hospitality work, had evaporated.


Data show that black workers have also been hit hardest by the recession. The federal Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that black unemployment in August was 16.3%, contrasted with 8.7% for whites, 12% for Latinos and 9.6% overall. The overall unemployment rate in California was higher, at 12.4% last month, according to the state Employment Development Department.


Under a withering sun Saturday, Los Angeles County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas told the assembled group that $900 million of public projects were scheduled to begin soon, not including Phase 2 of the Expo light-rail line and other transit projects also expected to generate thousands of jobs.


"There's a lot of work," he said. "We ought to have access to it.… We don't want to do it … catch as catch can."


With big transit projects and LAX renovations in the near future, Cuevas said training programs would be crucial to ensuring a flow of new workers into the job market.


Among the volunteers was Alisha Doyle, 27, who is learning how to work with power tools and apply for apprenticeships through a program called WINTER, Women in Non Traditional Employment Roles.


Madelyn Broadus, who last week received her journeyman's license as a sheet metal worker but, like many other volunteers, is unemployed, said her goal was to get more women like herself into well-paying construction jobs. A Boston University graduate, Broadus said she got the "bug" for construction after never earning more than $18.50 an hour as a mortgage loan processor.


Broadus, who previously worked on L.A. Live and the downtown Marriott hotel, said supervisors often "don't know where to put me." But she added she was capable and eager. "I will put my life on the line," she said.




martha.groves@latimes.com

Copyright © 2010, Los Angeles Times

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 24, 2010 at 8:03pm

Texting While Driving Is Taking A Deadly Toll on Roads

(HealthDay News) -- Distracted driving fatalities caused by cell phone use and texting soared in the space of three years, according to new U.S. government research released Thursday Sept. 24, 2010..


Texting alone caused more than 16,000 deaths in car accidents from 2001 to 2007, the researchers estimated. But auto deaths involving cell phones and texting while driving rose 28 percent in just three years, from 4,572 in 2005 to 5,870 in 2008.


"The increases in distracted driving seem to be largely driven by increased use of cell phones to text," said lead researcher Fernando Wilson, an assistant professor in the School of Public Health at the University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth.


"Overall use of cell phones have been pretty steady, but texting volumes have increased dramatically in the last few years," he added.


Distracted driving and its deadly toll was the focus of a government summit this week in Washington, D.C., at which officials called for tougher laws to counter the growing trend. They reported that more than 5,000 people were killed last year in distracted driving crashes.


In January, the government banned truck and bus drivers who travel interstate roadways from using a handheld device to send text messages.


The latest report, published online Sept. 23 in the American Journal of Public Health, uses data from the National Center for Statistics and Analysis's Fatality Analysis Reporting System, which recorded all fatalities that occurred on public roads in the United States from 1999 to 2008.


Wilson's team found that drunk drivers are less inhibited about using cell phones as they drive. And there were also increased crashes into light poles, trees and other objects, with men involved in growing numbers.


"All this is consistent with people not paying attention while they are driving," Wilson said.


Solving the problem is complex, Wilson noted. He has no ready answers, but he suggested that "we need technologies that inhibit cell phone use while driving" and that more effective law enforcement of cell phone bans would also help.


Frank Drews, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Utah, said that "this is a timely study that adds another piece to the literature on driver distraction."


Drews added: "With work like this, it will be a little bit harder to deny that cell phone use while driving has a significant negative impact on public safety. I think at this point, once again, the question comes to mind, how much more scientific evidence will politicians need to put laws in place that protect the public from the dangers associated with cell phone use while driving?"


Jennifer Smith, a board member of FocusDriven, which advocates against cell phone use while driving, put it more bluntly.


The more than 5,000 traffic deaths each year from cell phone use is "equivalent to a major airliner going down every week in this country," she said. "If that was happening, they would ground all flights until they figured out what the problem was and they solved it. But because everyone likes their cell phones, we have to debate this."


Smith noted that all cell phone use when driving -- including hands-free cell phone use -- is dangerous. "All we need to be doing in our cars is driving. No phone call is that important that you can't wait until you stop," she said.




More information

For more on distracted driving, visit the U.S. National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 24, 2010 at 7:38pm

Celebrities And Their Billionaire Beaus

Couple: Janet Jackson & Wissam Al Mana
The best way to get over an ex? Snag a wealthy businessman from Quatar. Janet Jackson, 44, got together with Wissam Al Mana -- the 30-something director of the Middle Eastern luxury company Al Mana Retail -- following her breakup with longtime partner Jermaine Dupri. Jackson and Al Mana went public earlier this year, making appearances at Paris Fashion Week and on the streets of London where she'd been promoting "Why Did I Get Married Too?”

Couple: Tyra Banks & John Utendahl
It takes a strong, confident man to handle Tyra Banks. Enter John Utendahl, the dashing -- and deep-pocketed -- boyfriend of the over-the-top supermodel and entrepreneur. The pair typically keeps a low profile, but it was a special occasion Monday night when they arrived hand-in-hand to the "Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps" premiere in New York. Utendahl, who is in his fifties, first hooked up with Banks, 36, in 2007 and they've been quietly dating ever since. The businessman is a veteran Wall Street banker and owner of the Utendahl Group, an investment-banking firm.

Couple: Salma Hayek & Francois-Henri Pinault
First came baby, then came marriage for Salma Hayek and Francois-Henri Pinault. The 44-year-old actress and the 48-year-old French luxury magnate -- he's the CEO of the PPR group, which oversees Gucci and Balenciaga, among other brands -- welcomed daughter Valentina in September 2007. They announced their engagement the following summer only to call it off months later. Reconciliation followed and so did two marriage ceremonies: one in City Hall in Paris and another in Venice. A win for both Hayek and Henri!

Couple: Naomi Campbell & Vladislav Doronin
Naomi Campbell met her real estate mogul boyfriend Vladislav Doronin at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, and now lives with him in Moscow. The 40-year-old supermodel brought Doronin to her appearance on “Oprah” in May. Sitting in the studio audience, he revealed he was legally married but separated from his wife of more than 10 years. "We don't live together," he said. Campbell told Oprah, "I like the men to wear the pants. I don't want to wear the pants. I like men who know what they want, know what they're doing, make their own decisions."

Couple: Padma Lakshmi & Teddy Forstmann
Stunning "Top Chef" host Padma Lakshmi recently celebrated her 40th birthday with a lavish dinner party hosted by the wildly wealthy Teddy Forstmann, who is 30 years her senior. The chairman and CEO of IMG talent agency reportedly hired cancan dancers, contortionists, and a marching band. (That is love!) In February, Lakshmi gave birth to her first child, daughter Krishna, now 7 months old. (Krishna's bio-dad is, reportedly, businessman Adam Dell, the younger brother of computer honcho Michael Dell.)

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 24, 2010 at 6:45pm

(NEWS EXCLUSIVE)
New York: Rikers Island Guard Wins $54 Million Lottery Jackpot

E-X-C-L-U-S-I-V-E


She's been homeless, bankrupt, a robbery victim and assaulted on the job -- but radiant Rikers Island guard Garina Fearon now has 54 million glorious reasons to start living la dolce vita.


The 34-year-old single mom from East New York, Brooklyn, who has endured a lifetime of hardship and poverty, told The Post she's the mystery winner of last Friday's Mega Millions drawing.


"I wanted a better life. I was struggling as a single parent," a beaming Fearon said yesterday. "I've really come back from nothing."


She never imagined such joy was possible when she was down to her last $25 six years ago and forced to file for bankruptcy.


Hard times struck again two years later, when burglars robbed her apart ment while she was at work guarding danger ous inmates.


Fearon, who spent part of her youth in a homeless shelter with no stable family, went on to endure sickening abuse from the monsters in her care.


"She's had feces thrown in her face and on her uniform in the years that she's been there," said a fellow jail guard. "She's a tough young lady."


How she won is as re markable as her change of fortune.


Fearon said she bought the wrong ticket at a Sutter Ave nue bodega, where she went to play Powerball, not Mega Millions.


"I only play every six months or so," said Fearon, who has a 16-year-old son and a 14-year-old daughter.


She held on to the ticket all weekend, and didn't think about it until Monday, when she asked a co-worker for a newspaper. She scribbled the winning numbers on the back of an inmate pass as her shift ended.


As she waited for the bus, she made the amazing discovery.


"I was about to fold up the lottery ticket," Fearon said. "Then I saw the numbers, and I started running from one part of the parking lot to the other screaming."


She still hasn't come down from her high.


"I don't know what I'm going to do," she said. "It's something unexpected."


The first thing on her "to-do" list was to talk to supervisors at the Correction Department. She said she feels too loyal to the job to let it go, even with all that money coming her way.


"I'm going to go to my job to get some days off," Fearon said. "I don't want to resign."


Fearon said it was her correction career that rescued her from her financial ruin.


Her top priority is taking care of her ailing mom.


"I'm from Jamaica," Fearon said. "I have a sick mother. She has diabetes, and I'm going to buy my mom a house in Jamaica."


Fearon said she will take the lump-sum option, which will pay her about $30 million before taxes. Beyond that, she's not sure what she'll do next.


"I don't know anything about all this kind of money," she said.

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 21, 2010 at 2:11pm

Ex-City Manager Among 8 Arrested This Morning in Bell, California Scandal

By JOHN ROGERS, Associated Press Writer

LOS ANGELES – The mayor and ex-city manager of the Los Angeles suburb of Bell were among eight current and former city officials arrested Tuesday in a corruption scandal that authorities said cost the city more than $5 million in excessive salaries and illegal personal loans.


The district attorney's office said several former and current City Council members were taken into custody along with ex-city manager Robert Rizzo and Mayor Oscar Hernandez.


"This, needless to say, is corruption on steroids," District Attorney Steve Cooley said at a news conference, standing next to a display of pictures of the suspects.


The district attorney, state attorney general and others have been investigating officials in the small working-class city since it was disclosed this summer that they were paying themselves huge salaries.


Rizzo, who was making nearly $800,000 a year, was booked on 53 counts of misappropriation of public funds and conflict of interest.


The investigations involve allegations of corruption, misuse of public funds and voter fraud in the city where one in six of the 40,000 residents live in poverty.


A message left at Rizzo's Huntington Beach home was not immediately returned.


Others arrested were former assistant city manager Angela Spaccia, Vice Mayor Teresa Jacobo, council members George Mirabal and Luis Artiga, and former council members George Cole and Victor Bello.


Former Police Chief Randy Adams, who was also scrutinized in the salary scandal, was not taken into custody.


Cooley, who knew Adams when he was the police chief in Glendale, said there was no evidence he committed any crimes.


"Being paid excessive salaries is not a crime," Cooley said. "Illegally obtaining those salaries is a crime."


Prosecutors allege the suspects misappropriated more than $5.5 million, including making illegal personal loans.


The complaint also said Rizzo made $4.3 million by paying himself through different employment contracts that were not approved by the City Council, and that council members paid themselves a combined $1.25 million for what Cooley called "phantom meetings" of various city boards and agencies.


Rizzo also was accused of giving $1.9 million in loans to himself, Spaccia, Hernandez, Artiga and dozens of others, authorities said.


Most of the arrests went smoothly, though police used a battering ram at the home of Hernandez before he opened the door.


The suspects were booked into county facilities and will be kept away from other inmates for their protection, sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said.


The arrests were the latest twist in a scandal that emerged in July with the disclosure that Rizzo was paid almost twice the salary of President Barack Obama.


It also was revealed that Adams was making $457,000 a year, and Spaccia was paid $376,288. Four of the five City Council members paid themselves nearly $100,000 a year for their part-time service.


Rizzo, Adams and Spaccia resigned and the council members reduced their salaries to about $8,000 following the disclosures and angry public reaction.


The four council members are currently the target of a recall.


Last week, Attorney General Jerry Brown sued eight current and former officials of Bell, accusing them of defrauding taxpayers by granting themselves salaries he said were far higher than warranted for the jobs they were doing.


Cooley said the investigation was not over and more charges could be filed.


"They used the taxes of the hardworking citizens of Bell as their own piggy bank, which they looted," he said.

___

Associated Press Writer Thomas Watkins also contributed to this report.

Comment by Phoebe Macon on September 17, 2010 at 12:51am

World's Most Valuable Brands Named


Top 100 Global Brands: Apple Soars, BP Slumps and Coke's Still No. 1

Brand consultant Interbrand is out with its annual top 100 "Best Global Brands" ranking, with Coca-Cola topping the list for the eleventh straight year.

"They are ruthlessly consistent in the way they deliver their brand," says Jez Frampton, group CEO at Interbrand. "They are a fantastic case study about how to do it properly. "

On the other hand, BP could be a case study in what not to do when it comes to managing a brand. In the wake of the Gulf spill, BP fell out of the top 100 rankings after being on the list for nine years.".

"We all know how they handled the tactical issues around the spill itself. What they really haven't given us is a clear view to where BP is going in the longer term," Frampton says. "How would you feel right now as a BP employee? Companies are only as good as the people that work for them. Giving a clear vision to people inside and out is very important to them right now."

In contrast to BP, Toyota was able to better manage its recall scandal, he notes, although the carmaker did drop to number 11 in the rankings vs. number 8 in 2009.

The Top 10 (value in millions)

1. Coca-Cola: $70,452

2. IBM: $64,727

3. Microsoft: $60,895

4. Google: $43,557

5. GE: $42,808

6. McDonald's: $33,578

7. Intel: $32,015

8. Nokia: $29,495

9. Disney: $28,731

10. H-P: $26,867

In the accompanying clip, Frampton and I discuss these and other trends in the brand ranking, including:

Tech Rules: Technology firms -- IBM, Microsoft, Google, Intel, Nokia and HP -- comprise six of the top 10 global brands. Apple is "only" number 17, which seems low given its mindshare (and growing market share). But Apple is the "fastest-grower in terms of brand value" among the Top 100 firms, and should continue to rise in the years ahead, Frampton predicts; barring any issues with iconic CEO Steve Jobs, that is. Yahoo! made the list at No. 66, ahead of names like Porsche and Gap.

Financial Follies: The credit crisis and its aftermath -- big bailouts and big bonuses -- did great damage to the brand value of firms like Citigroup and UBS, Frampton says. Amazingly, Goldman Sachs' actually moved up in the top 100 rankings (to number 37 vs. 38 in 2009) despite all the negative press it received last year. "Brands take time to react," Frampton says. "This has certainly affected Goldman's reputation and its brand. How this plays out in the future will depend largely on them. They have an opportunity to take a much stronger lead in the rebuilding of the financial services market."

Watch the accompanying video for Frampton's predictions on which emerging market-based companies are most likely to make the list in the future, how HP's brand looks after the scandalous departure of Mark Hurd and which company was the biggest surprise in this year's top 100.


To see the Full List of the Top 100 Brands click here: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-16/coca-cola-retains-title-as...

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