| As Redliner
Community Bank NA Spins Elmira Delay Inner
City Press Files Its Disparate Data
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon Story
BBC
- Guardian
UK - Honduras
- ESPN
FEDERAL COURT / S
Bronx, Feb 12 – Whether or not
the U.S. Community
Reinvestment Act will be again
enforced until the now
year-old Administration and
its regulators remains an open
question.
On
February 12 Fair Finance Watch
with Inner City Press on the
FOIA filed comments with the
Office of the Comproller of
the Currency against Community
Bank N.A.'s application to
acquire Elmira Savings Bank:
The applicant Community Bank
National Association in 2020
in New York State based on its
disparate marketing made 4329
mortgage loans to whites, with
871 denials to whites -- while
making only TWENTY SEVEN loans
to African Americans, with
five denials. This is far out
of keeping with the
demographics, and others
lenders, in NYS - this is
outrageous. Beyond
its lending disparities,
Community Bank N.A. is a
branch closer, see e.g.,
"Community Bank closing four
locations,"
https://www.mytwintiers.com/news-cat/local/community-bank-closing-four-locations/,
listing CBNA's closure of
branches in Hornell at 7279
Seneca Rd., Bath Plaza branch
located at 201 Bath and
Hammondsport Railroad, the
Canaseraga branch located at
37 Main St., and the
Wellsville branch at 4196
Bolivar Road.
There is no public benefit to
this
proposal.
FFW and Inner City Press have
been deeply concerned about
the rush by the OCC's penchant
to rubberstamp mergers by
redliners, particularly during
the pandemic. We timely
request public hearings."
This comes after
this exchange:
"Erik Zwick: What
was the driver of the decision
to move the closing of Elmira
to 2Q?
Mark Tryniski: I
don't know if it's so much a
decision on our part, it's
just on expectations around
where we see the trend of the
regulatory approval process
going. So we decided to push
it off two months further out
just based on the progress and
the dialogue with the
regulators. I mean, there's
nothing of note or
concern. I think it's
just right now with the
administration and the pending
appointments of some of the
agency leadership and the -
I'll call it, the interest of
all of the regulatory agencies
on every single transaction,
even those who have a, let's
call it, tangential
involvement, it's a lot more
[indiscernible] slow everyone
out there, that's just the
trend right now. So we just
decided to push it out a
couple of months to be
sure.
Erik Zwick:
Got it. That makes sense."
No, it
only makes sense to insiders.
Inner City
Press (and Fair Finance Watch,
on the HMDA) will have more to
say about this. Watch this
site.
***
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