News
Special Needs Assistance Program (SNAP) grants from BankPlus and FHLB Dallas are helping income-qualified special needs homeowners pay for home repairs. Jenice Luckett, 60, had been living on disability after suffering an injury to her back. She didn't have enough money to repair a roof so leaky that her grandchildren would joke it was raining in the living room. A $6,000 SNAP grant from BankPlus and FHLB Dallas allowed Luckett to pay for a new roof. "I am delighted to work with FHLB Dallas each and every year," said Mark Ouellette, first vice president and director of Affordable Housing at BankPlus. "By giving members access to meaningful programs like SNAP, we are able make a significant, visible impact on the lives of our neighbors and communities."
According to a report by Pew Charitable Trust, nearly two million American’s spent a total of $3 billion at auto title storefronts across the country to borrow money against the value of their cars. Predatory auto loans can be even more dangerous than payday loans because they are much larger; the typical auto title loan averages $1,000 and comes with an annual percentage rate of about 300%. The typical auto title loan represents nearly 50% of a borrower’s gross monthly income. Pew proposes several regulations for safe auto lending, including measures that would ensure that the borrower has the ability to repay the loan, restrict the use of balloon payments and eliminate harmful collection practices.
Carver Federal Savings Bank CEO Michael Pugh is making a major push to attract customers back to the 67-year old Harlem institution. For many years, Carver was the bedrock of the neighborhood's business community, one of the only banks that would work with Harlem’s black businesses. But in the post-crisis years, Carver struggled to recover from a portfolio filled with failed subprime loans. To reinvigorate the bank, Mr. Pugh is engaging the community, asking churches and nonprofits to connect it with new customers. Pugh also plans to introduce a new line of business loans of $10,000 or less. "If a person who's running a kiosk on 125th Street came looking for a loan, another bank might offer him a credit card—or nothing," he said. "We're going to provide something better."
A bipartisan attempt to regulate payday lenders in South Dakota has been halted, the latest in a series of state-level efforts to be dismantled by payday industry lobbyists. The South Dakota bill was led by conservative state legislator Steve Hickey and former Obama campaigner Steve Hildebrand — ideological opposites unified against predatory lending. Despite being deeply involved in the crafting of the bill, payday industry lobbyists suddenly turned against the effort, which was killed in committee. When Hildebrand and Hickey tried to revive their effort with a ballot initiative, State Senator Corey Brown put forward a bill doubling the amount of signatures required to enact the caps, effectively killing the effort.
Ross Alan Hill, founder and CEO of Oklahoma City based Bank2, tells a story of hope and redemption in his new book Broken Pieces: Nothing is Wasted. Hill explains that he takes inspiration from Redento Raffinato, a style of blown-glass art in which broken glass fragments are reused to create elegant vases. Hill says that he sees his vase as a spiritual symbol, a physical reminder of redemption in his own life — and of the redemption that is part of Bank2's mission. “We respect our employees, customers, our friends and our community,” Hill said. “We know that brokenness is part of life, and when people are going through broken times, we try to be a friend.”
The House Financial Services Committee has renewed its look at regulatory relief for small financial institutions, pressing bankers and credit union representatives for details about their compliance burdens. “We are losing more than one [community bank] a day and they are not perishing of natural causes,” said Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas), chairman of the committee. “The sheer weight, volume, cost, complexity and uncertainty of federal regulation is a burden that is killing them off,” he warned. Although Democrats have said they are wary of any relief that undermines Dodd-Frank and have cautioned against placing too much blame on the measure, some support the need for targeted reform.
The CDFI Fund is soliciting comments on its evaluation of the Bank Enterprise Award (BEA) Program. The BEA helps banks provide credit and financial services in areas with high poverty. The BEA Program Evaluation assesses the effectiveness of the BEA Program as a mechanism for providing performance-based awards, the influence of the BEA Program on bank behavior and the impact of BEA Program-eligible investments in CDFIs and in distressed communities. The deadline for comment submission is May 18, 2015.
Mission Valley Bancorp plans to close an underused branch in Valencia, California at the end of the month with the intention of replacing it with a new, streamlined “branch of the future” nearby. Chief Executive Tamara Gurney said the decision to close the branch reflects changing technology in the banking industry. “A branch of 4,000-square-feet is probably twice the size of what the branch of the future will look like. Some of them are down to kiosks of 1,000-square-feet now, because we don’t need big vaults and people don’t use safe deposit boxes like they used to,” she said. “The bank is doing extremely well. In 2014 we grew our net loans by over $20 million,” Gurney said. Last week, the bank also approved its first-ever dividend payment to stockholders.
A new startup called Bankjoy wants to make it easier to provide modern mobile banking by rolling out a customizable banking app aimed at small banks and credit unions. Bankjoy founder Michael Duncan hopes to differentiate his product from offerings of other mobile banking vendors with a sleek, intuitive user interface and innovative features. The app will include many hallmarks of big banks' mobile offerings -- including the ability to log in using a PIN on your smartphone, make remote deposits using a smartphone camera, manage debit cards, set financial savings goals, make person-to-person payments and pay bills from your phone. The appearance of the app will be brand-conscious with customizable bank logos and color schemes.
A campaign of concentrated financing by Southern Bancorp is showing positive outcomes in Helena-West Helena, Ark. Southern Bancorp has loaned about $14 million to fund renovations and new construction on 17 properties in downtown Helena-West Helena over the past 10 years — about $2 million of that in the past two years alone. The city’s development strategy has included financing new business and schools as well as tourist sites that celebrate the city’s rich civil war and blues heritage. “It’s hard to keep up with all the stuff that’s going on,” said Dominik Mjartan, executive vice president of Southern Bancorp. For Mjartan, Helena-West Helena’s development is part of the bank’s mission of economic equality: “Should your ZIP code really determine whether you have a chance at a decent life?”