OK, I am going to have to derivate from talking about banks to just weigh in with a brief editorial.

ACORN‘s Bertha Lewis sent out an email 12 minutes ago entitled “Sting the Stinger.” You got the email if you are on one of their mailing lists.  I am on one of their mailing lists, because our organization is a member of a non-profit coalition that includes representatives from the North Carolina division of Acorn.  You could infer that I’m hardly someone with a predisposition against ACORN, or against the progressive causes that they have worked to support for years.

Lewis is out for blood, specifically the blood that would come from the scalp of James O’Keefe.  Young Mr. O’Keefe is in trouble, sitting in a Louisiana jail and perhaps destined for a federal prison.  Seems to me like the Stinger is going to be pretty well stung.

O’Keefe has been arrested on the grounds that he entered federal property for the purposes of committing a felony at Senator Mary Landrieu’s office.

Lewis wants to use that moment to revisit the sting that O’Keefe put on Acorn last fall.  They are arguing that O’Keefe should be prosecuted for videotaping ACORN folks without their consent. Lewis writes:

“he videotaped ACORN folks without their consent…fight back against the corporate paymasters and their attack dogs seeking to disrupt this work by getting CA and MD to investigate James O’Keefe’s allegedly illegal videotapes of ACORN employees.“

Now, I work in policy, so it is hard for me to ignore how this kind of decision, if pursued, could create precedent to stifle investigative reporting. Let’s imagine that it was “against the law to videotape ACORN folks without their consent” (Lewis quote)…Well let’s imagine that the law didn’t hold Acorn to a higher (more…)

The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC) released the new Home Mortgage Disclosure Act records for 2008 this week.  The data, referred to as “HMDA data,” covers 14.2 million mortgage loan applications and another 2.9 million mortgage loan purchases on the secondary market.  Want to see what I am talking about? You can download the data here.

The HMDA data is released to help citizens understand how banks and other lenders are working in their neighborhoods.  It was legislated through the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, and it dovetails within the broader aims of the Community Reinvestment Act.

New legislation is on the table in DC that would counter the shortcomings of this data.  HMDA is broken.  (more…)

Taylor is back.  A passing comment can’t be ignored – it is so opaque – but also significant.  He comments, “in my neighborhood, Roxbury, where I grew up…”

That’s a telling comment because Roxbury is in Barney Frank’s district.  Taylor represents NCRC in DC, but he actually lives in Boston, in Frank’s district.

Rep. Marchant wants to talk about extending CRA to new institutions.  This is a hot subject.  Credit unions and insurance companies may get a CRA obligation.  It seems very likely that if CRA Modernization passes, that it would extend coverage to independent mortgage companies.

Rep. Marchant (R-Tx): “Is it your opinion that even if the CRA was properly enforced under current law, would it bring enough money to neighborhoods?”

Taylor: it is not well enforced.

The Mass. Commissioner of Banks points out that while no state-chartered institutions are currently not meeting their requirements under the Mass. state law, some did not always reach that level.  And, he says, credit unions have not (more…)

This year’s winner of the prestigious World Press Photo Award goes to Anthony Suau for his picture of a police officer in Cleveland, Ohio during a foreclosure eviction.

The World Press Photo of the Year for 2008: Detective Robert Kole must ensure residents have moved out of their home, Cleveland, Ohio, March 26,2008.

The picture was taken during a two-day assignment by Suau.  He rode along with a team of officers as they did a long round of foreclosures evictions.

A couple of years ago, this kind of assignment would have been relatively impossible to imagine: sure, officers had some evictions, mainly for tenants and mainly at the beginning of the month.  Here, its an all-day piece of work that appears to be going on during the 26th day of the month.  So its full-time, all the time, for officers like Kole.

In Detroit, Wayne County Sheriff Warren Evans announced in early February that his staff would cease to evict homeowners.  In Ohio, Representative Marcy Kaptur has suggested that homeowners should go ahead and stay in their homes, in spite of orders for them to leave. ACORN is attempting to disrupt or halt auction sales at courthouse steps in Baltimore, and protested actions in Raleigh, St. Louis, Oakland, and Cleveland.

Anthony Suau is a decorated war photographer who has published great work on the fall of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.

In the wake of Obaba’s Homeowner Affordability and Stability Plan, many people are wondering if throwing a lifeline to borrowers will have its intended impact.

The big banks appear to like the plan.  So does Fannie Mae.  The market was mixed.  Bank stocks fell on the day, but overall, the Dow was about even. The Wall Street Journal’s Editorial Page is already coming out against the idea.

The doubt stems from research that shows that a high percentage of modified loans still end up delinquent, in default, and potentially in foreclosure.  John Dugan, Comptroller of the OCC, recently published research that shows that more than half of all loans modified in 2008 ended up in default.  The research only covered first lien loans.  So, that is some pretty (more…)