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Petitions for payday loan cap, minimum wage hike, tobacco tax meet deadline to get on ballot

This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, May 6, 2012 – Activists involved in two initiative-petition drives – to cap payday loan rates and to increase Missouri’s minimum wage – submitted more than 350,000 signatures to the secretary of state’s office shortly before Sunday’s 5 p.m. deadline. The two groups were “Missourians for Responsible Lending” and “Give Missourians a Raise,” which had similar coalitions of community groups, religious leaders and some unions. Each proposal needs certified signatures from 91,818 to 99,600 registered voters to get on the November ballot. The signatures must include a required minimum from at least six of the state’s nine congressional districts, with the exact overall number needed depending on which six were chosen.

Opportunity for organizations that serve economically vulnerable populations to receive support

For the past five years, the Bureau’s Office of Community Affairs has supported organizations committed to helping people manage their money and work toward their goals using a suite of financial empowerment tools called Your Money, Your Goals. If your organization serves economically vulnerable populations and you are interested in gaining more intensive support, such as training and technical assistance for your consumer financial empowerment efforts, you can apply for the Your Money, Your Goals 2020 cohort.

DCS2019 Session: Where Technology Meets Collections

No, it’s not all about an Alien species.  DCS2019 highlights some of the best educational sessions available.  On Thursday, September 12th, hear from technology and operational experts on topics such as: Understanding the role of AI and machine learning in your organization, Key elements in implementing AI in the collection process, key risks with technology, leveraging new technologies, innovations in identity intelligence, optimizing right party contacts and decreasing operational costs!  Joining our panel to start are: Dan Fox, SmartAction, Abhishek Goel, Dasceq, Matthew Wolk, Neustar, Gregory Allen, Pairity and more to be announced!  Mark your calendars and don’t miss this special session at Debt Connection Symposium & Expo, to be held September 10th – 12th at the Red Rock in Las Vegas.  Still time to register at the Early Bird Pricing, check it out at https://debtconnectionsymposium.com/

 

BankThink The case for market-based CRA reform

The Community Reinvestment Act was enacted in 1977 to hold banks accountable for “meeting the credit needs” of their local communities in a safe and sound manner. Yet if the CRA was not in place today, would stakeholders want to enact it? Many people may be inclined to answer affirmatively simply based on the CRA’s statutory goal. Furthermore, when it became law, many low-income and minority communities found mortgage and small-business lending hard to come by. At the time, the CRA sought to address persistent and institutionalized credit discrimination going back to the 1930s, when the government-sponsored Home Owners’ Loan Corporation discouraged banks from providing credit to “hazardous” areas, colored red on HOLC-issued maps. Such “redlining” prevailed for decades.

Teachers union sues Betsy DeVos over loan forgiveness program

Washington (CNN)The American Federation of Teachers union sued Education Secretary Betsy DeVos Thursday, alleging that the department has mismanaged a federal program that grants teachers and other public service workers loan forgiveness after they make 10 years of payments.   About 1% of the more than 73,000 borrowers who have applied for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program have been granted relief since the program was created in 2007, according to department data.

JPMorgan Chase credit card customers have a month to opt out of binding arbitration

JPMorgan Chase is trying to make it harder for its credit card customers to sue the bank in court by requiring them to go into private arbitration to settle disputes.   The opportunity for JPMorgan Chase credit cardholders to opt out of binding arbitration expires in a month.  The bank notified customers in May that their right to sue over grievances connected to their Chase credit cards will go away unless they take some action by the first week in August.

IRS Staffs Up As a Result of Disputed Private Debt Collection Program

In its latest congressionally-mandated report on contracting out collection of recalcitrant tax debts, the Internal Revenue Service said it is hiring 100 specialist staffers this fall and plans to bring on another 100 in a year The revival of an earlier program required by Congress in 2015 contracts with four private companies which, under specified rules, go after delinquent taxpayers the IRS has been unable to collect from. Critics—including the just-departed National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson—blast the public-private partnership for superseding an IRS core function and for deploying company bill collectors who are not always sensitive to the challenges of low-income taxpayers.

Trump blasts Bitcoin, Facebook’s Libra, demands they face banking regulations

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday criticized Bitcoin, Facebook’s proposed Libra digital coin and other cryptocurrencies and demanded that companies seek a banking charter and make themselves subject to U.S. and global regulations if they wanted to “become a bank.”

How Nevada Plans to Solve the Marijuana Banking Problem

Nevada hopes to be the first state to create its own banking system for the booming marijuana industry, which has generated more than $150 million in tax revenue since 2017, according to Nevada Treasurer Zach Conine’s office. Since the drug is still illegal under federal law, most banks won’t accept cannabis businesses as clients. As a result, the multimillion-dollar industry is mainly a cash business — at least for now

6th Cir. Rejects FCRA ‘Credit File Disclosure’ Claim for Lack of Spokeo Standing

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit recently held that a plaintiff lacked Article III standing to sue a consumer reporting agency under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) for allegedly failing to disclose all information in his file.