| As CFPB Evades Public
Process With Advisory Opinions Its Whitewash
of Mortgage Continues With Attack on CRA
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon
Honduras
- The
Source - The
Root - etc
Bronx / SDNY,
March 6 – With
US Comptroller
of the
Currency
Joseph Otting formally
moving along
with the FDIC
to undermine
the
Community
Reinvestment
Act, on January
11 Inner
City Press /
Fair Finance
Watch filed a
CRA protest
with the OCC to
Community
Bank NA's
application to
acquire Steuben
Trust Company.
The
Otting's OCC
is now trying
to intimidate
groups with
phone
"interviews"
of which the OCC
won't show the
target their
write-ups.
On March 6
the Consumer
Financial
Protection
Bureau (CFPB)
announced "plans
to create an
advisory
opinion
program which,
if enacted,
would
circumvent the
public
notice-and-comment
process, a
pillar of our
government and
democracy. The
intent of the
advisory
opinion
program,
according to
the CFPB,
would be to
provide clear
guidance to
assist
companies in
better
understanding
their legal
and regulatory
obligations
through
advisory
opinions. But
in actuality,
the CFPB is
proposing to
sidestep the
usual public
notice-and-comment
rulemaking
process under
the
Administrative
Procedures
Act, and the
congressionally-mandated
process for
providing
interpretations
of the Truth
and Lending
Act.
Worse, once
these
interpretations
are issued,
they could be
entitled to a
level of
deference
almost equal
to that of
regular
rulemaking,
outside of the
context of the
original
requester.
Agencies that
issue advisory
opinions
usually end up
with a welter
of
contradictory,
mostly
pro-industry
interpretations
that have the
long-term
impact of
undermining
the
credibility of
the agency and
the deference
accorded to
it." This
is a pattern.
The CFPB under
Kathy Kraninger issued 2018
Home Mortgage Disclosure Act
data - with an interface
without any racial or ethnic
information unlike 2017 and
every previous year,
undermining the entire purpose
of the HMDA law. See this
page and this December 16
filing with FDIC, cc-ed to the
CFPB:
December 16,
2019 Via e-mail
Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation Attn:
John Vogel, Regional Director
and Doreen R. Eberley, Jim
Watkins, Robert P. Cordeiro,
Scott D. Strockoz 350 Fifth
Avenue, Suite 1200 New York,
NY 10118-0110
Re: Timely First
Comment on Applications by
Flushing Bank to Acquire
Empire National Bank
Dear Regional
Director Vogel and others at
the FDIC:
This is a timely
first comment opposing and
requesting an extension of the
FDIC's public comment period
on the Applications by
Flushing Bank to Acquire
Empire National
Bank.
Flushing Bank in
2018, for race specified
loans, made six times more
loans to whites than to
African Americans, entirely
out of keeping with the
demographics of its
market.
Compare the
demographics of its lending to
the geography: 68 loans to
Queens, 35 in Manhattan, 27 in
The Bronx, 35 in Manhattan,
five on Staten Island and 24
in Westchester
County.
Inner City Press
/ Fair Finance Watch would
like to and has a right to
submit more detailed HMDA
data. But for the record, the
Consumer Financial Protection
Bureau for 2018 data has
unilaterally removed the
ability of the public to view
HMDA data by race on its
website, which the FFIEC /
Federal Reserve allowed in
previous years and the CFBP
did even in 2017.
Inner City Press
/ Fair Finance Watch contends
that the CFPB's move is both
anti-public and
illegal.
For further
context, last week the FDIC
opted in a party line vote to
go with the OCC of ex-banker
Otting which is trying to
further weaken the CRA, and
has already in rogue-like
fashion barred the public from
comment on charter conversion
and even merger applications
like that involving Chinatown
FSB earlier this
year.
In this context,
Inner City Press / Fair
Finance Watch is demanding an
extension of this comment
period by the FDIC, its
intervention with the CFPB to
restore access on the website
itself to 2018 HMDA data, a
reversal of the FDIC's
anti-CRA moves, and on the
current record the denial by
the FDIC of these
application(s). Thank
you for your prompt
attention,
Matthew R. Lee
Inner City Press / Fair
Finance Watch
cc's incl
Brenda.Muniz [at] cfpb.gov
Watch
this site.
***
Your
support means a lot. As little as $5 a month
helps keep us going and grants you access to
exclusive bonus material on our Patreon
page. Click
here to become a patron.
Feedback:
Editorial [at] innercitypress.com
SDNY Press Room 480, front cubicle
500 Pearl Street, NY NY 10007 USA
Mail: Box 20047, Dag
Hammarskjold Station NY NY 10017
Reporter's mobile (and weekends):
718-716-3540
Other, earlier Inner City Press are
listed here,
and some are available in the ProQuest
service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright 2006-2019 Inner City
Press, Inc. To request reprint or other
permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
innercitypress.com for
|
,
