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Why The Community Reinvestment Act Should Be Expanded Broadly Across The Financial Industry
An antidote to discrimination, the Community Reinvestment Act says banks have an affirmative obligation to serve all communities. It’s time to extend that obligation to all of the financial sector, including insurance, securities and non-bank mortgage lenders. [Read more]
Lending Discrimination Faced By Same-Sex Couples In The Mortgage Arena
LGBTQ+ Americans are less likely to own their homes when compared to their straight, cisgender counterparts, and they are more likely to experience financial hardship. [Read more]
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News
Mortgage Data Reveals Disparities In Asian American And Pacific Islander Lending
New research has revealed for the first time that some Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) mortgage borrowers are paying far more for their loans than others. [Read more]
NCRC Supports Pandemic-Related Housing Needs In 15 States, Funded By Wells Fargo Foundation
Nonprofit housing counseling organizations responding to the COVID-19 pandemic in 15 states will receive unrestricted grants and resources from the National Community Reinvestment Coalition (NCRC), thanks to funding from the Wells Fargo Foundation. [Read more]
NCRC And SLEHCRA Call On Edward Jones To Add St. Louis Assessment Area For New Banking Division
NCRC and the St. Louis Equal Housing and Community Reinvestment Alliance (SLEHCRA) have urged the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to require Edward Jones Bank to meet Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) assessment requirements in the St. Louis area. [Read more]
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Field Notes
New Member Profile: Horizons, A Family Service Alliance
For 60 years Horizons, A Family Service Alliance, based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, has been dedicated to providing opportunities to improve the lives of individuals and families. [Read more]
Limiting Contraceptive Coverage Threatens Women’s Economic Gains
Contraception gives women more control over their bodies, their health and their present and future lives. Such power over women’s agency should not be left to employers who cite religion or morality as a justification for rejecting contraceptive coverage. [Read more]
Member Spotlight: Q&A With Local First Arizona’s Thomas Barr
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to strain nonprofits and businesses beyond their comfort zones. NCRC members have stepped up in extraordinary ways to support their communities during this on-going national emergency. Thomas Barr is the Executive Director for Local First Arizona (LFA), the largest coalition of local businesses in North America. [Read more]
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Resources
Resources To Help Support The Black Lives Matter Movement
If you are interested in supporting Black Lives Matter, these resources may be helpful for you. [Read more]
NCRC COVID-19 Resource Page
We've compiled and are updating an index of COVID-19 resources for communities, small businesses, individuals and organizations that serve them, such as housing counseling agencies. [Read more]
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Upcoming Events
OCC True Lender Rulemaking
August 25, 1:00pm - 2:30pm ET
Join NCRC to learn more about the True Lender proposed rule making and how it may foster the return of "rent-a-charter" payday lending. [Register now]
Discovering Nonprofit Impact – Part II: Data Collection And Reporting
August 25, 2:00pm - 3:30pm ET
Join NCRC's Training Academy as we continue on the previous need assessments discussion from Part I. [Register now]
COVID-19 Foreclosure Prevention Counseling Update
August 26, 2:00pm - 3:30pm ET
Join NCRC as we discuss protections covered under the CARES Act and best practices to help your clients avoid the pitfalls of a forbearance plan. [Register now]
What’s New With The CFPB?
August 27, 1:00pm - 2:30pm ET
Join NCRC to discuss the recent CFPB Supreme Court decision, payday rule, and CFPB settlement regarding deadlines for the implementation of Section 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Act. [Register now]
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In the News
Structural Racism Helps Schemers Attract Blacks To Fake ‘Sou-sou’ Scams
The National Community Reinvestment Coalition (NCRC) and researchers from Utah State, Brigham Young and Rutgers partnered to send testers to 32 bank branches representing 17 randomly selected financial institutions in the D.C. metro area. Researchers wanted to see how Black business owners might be treated in seeking pandemic-related relief. [Washington Post]
Landlords Could Exploit COVID-19 Victims To Fast-track Evictions, Housing Advocates Say
“The interplay between gentrification and eviction is significant,” said Jesse Van Tol, CEO of National Community Reinvestment Coalition. “Eviction can facilitate new rounds of gentrification when landlords take it as an opportunity to fix up units and renovate to attract wealthier tenants and it can be used as an opportunity to extract more rent out of people.” [NBC]
$134 Billion Goes Untapped After PPP Deters Small Businesses
Some business owners—at least before certain criteria were relaxed—deemed it too tough to qualify for loan forgiveness in such an uncertain time. Still others weren’t even eligible or were discouraged by the lack of a banking relationship. Perhaps most disturbingly, some were dissuaded from applying because they were Black, an audit by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition showed. [The Balance]
America Caught COVID-19; Black America Caught Hell, Says Urban League
“It’s interesting that COVID-19 hit at right around the similar time as when the United States of America, really was grappling with issues of racial inequality, ignited by other incidents but ignited by the George Floyd killing. And so we have this public health crisis that was shutting America down as the reality of racial inequality was kind of sparking consciousness raising all across the country,” concurred Dedrick Asante Muhammad, chief of Race, Wealth and Community for the National Community Reinvestment Coalition. [Final Call]
NC Business Council - Black Businesses Matter
A “mystery shopping” study by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, a nonprofit in Washington, found that Black businesses with similar or slightly better financial profiles compared to White businesses, were offered different products and treated significantly worse than their White counterparts in 43% of the test encounters at branches of 17 banks. [Mebane Enterprise]
Given History Of Discrimination, Can Community Help Black-owned Businesses Survive COVID-19?
A 2019 study by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition provides a possible explanation: Researchers found banks treat Black applicants different from White applicants, encouraging White business owners to apply for one or more loans while discouraging Black business owners from applying for any. [Cronkite News]
PPP Loans Challenging To Secure For Some Minority-business Owners, Florida Data May Suggest
A study from the National Community Reinvestment Coalition found 43% of the time, banks treated Black PPP borrowers significantly worse and offered different products when compared to White borrowers with slightly weaker financial information. [WPTV]
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On Our Radar
How The Pandemic Is Making The Gender Pay Gap Worse
In-person service jobs, which have been hit hard by the pandemic, are disproportionately done by women. Yet the unemployment rate is only part of the story. [NPR]
‘Devastating:' The Census Bureau Is About To Severely Undercount Tribes
The U.S. Census Bureau unexpectedly announced it will end 2020 census field operations early, a decision that will disproportionately hurt Native American tribes that are already historically undercounted, hard to reach and rely on accurate census data for lifesaving federal dollars. [HuffPost]
Argentina's Largest Bank Just Made A ‘Historic’ Pledge To Hire More Transgender People
Argentina’s largest and state-owned bank has instituted a quota for hiring transgender people, a “historic” move that will ultimately result in a workforce that is at least 1% transgender. [Vice]
How the U.S. Government Promoted Housing Segregation In America’s Cities
"It's not being talked about enough," Rothstein says. "The attention to racial inequality that the Black Lives Matter movement has generated provides the opportunity to begin to consider the underlying residential segregation that perpetuates so much of the inequality, including police abuse, in this country." [U.S. News & World Report]
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#AfterThis: A Virtual Hug
Here's something new and different from NCRC to encourage hope, creativity and a Just Economy: afterth.is.
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