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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THuRSDAY, FEbRuARY 7, 2019
Financial watchdog to gut payday lending rules
By KEN SWEET
Associated Press
NEW YORK — The
nation’s federal financial
watchdog said Wednesday
that it plans to abolish most
of its critical consumer pro-
tections governing payday
lenders.
The move is a major
win for the payday lending
industry, which argued the
government’s regulations
could kill off a large chunk
of its business. It’s also a big
loss for consumer groups,
who say payday lenders
exploit the poor and dis-
advantaged with loans that
have annual interest rates as
much as 400 percent.
The cornerstone of the
regulations was a require-
ment that lenders make sure
borrowers could afford to
repay a payday loan with-
out being stuck in a cycle
of debt, a standard known
as “ability to repay.” This
standard would be elimi-
nated under the new rules.
Another part of the rules,
which would have limited
the number of payday loans
a person could roll over, was
also eliminated.
Critics of the pay-
day lending industry have
argued that without these
MERKLEY DENOUNCES
NEW PAYDAY LOAN RULES
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Oregon, lambast-
ed the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s new rules on
payday lenders.
“Every day the Trump Administration prioritizes the privi-
leged and powerful over working Americans, but deliber-
ately helping loan sharks to cannibalize the pocketbooks
of vulnerable families is a low blow even for them,” Merkley
said.
AP Photo/Sid Hastings
A manager of a financial services store in Ballwin, Mo., counts
cash being paid to a client as part of a loan.
underwriting standards, the
CFPB’s new regulations are
effectively toothless. The
main criticism of the payday
lending industry was that
many borrowers would take
months to repay a loan that
was originally designed only
to last a couple of weeks,
renewing the loan over and
over again.
“This proposal is not a
tweak to the existing rule
... it’s a complete disman-
tling of the consumer protec-
tions (the bureau) finalized
in 2017,” said Alex Horow-
itz, a researcher with Pew
Charitable Trusts, a think
tank whose research on the
industry was relied on heav-
ily by the bureau when the
original rules were unveiled
a year and a half ago.
The announcement was
the first abolition of reg-
ulations under the Con-
sumer Financial Protec-
tion Bureau’s new director,
Kathy Kraninger, who took
over the bureau late last
year. Mick Mulvaney, who
was appointed by Presi-
dent Donald Trump’s as act-
ing director of the bureau
in late 2017, announced a
year ago that the bureau was
intending to revisit the rules.
As a Congressman from
South Carolina, Mulvaney
received tens of thousands
of dollars in political dona-
tions from the payday lend-
ing industry, raising con-
cerns he was too connected
to the industry to appropri-
ately regulate it.
The Community Finan-
“Let’s call it for what it is: a payday predator protection plan.
Payday lenders prey on cash-strapped families during their
toughest times, often issuing loans with annual interest
rates as high as 500 percent and sucking families into an
inescapable vortex of debt.” he added.
“This payday predator protection plan is a huge mistake and
a crystal clear sign of where the Trump Administration sides
when it comes to working families.”
cial Services Association of
America, a payday lending
group, is holding its annual
conference in March at
Trump’s Doral golf club in
Miami. It held its conference
there last year, too. Govern-
ment watchdog groups have
criticized the use of Trump
hotels and resorts by busi-
nesses and lobbying groups
as legal bribery, a way to
influence regulation and pol-
icy by giving money to the
president.
The CFSA did not
respond to an Associated
Press request for comment
on that criticism, but sent a
statement saying it was “dis-
appointed” with certain reg-
ulations left intact and that
its members were looking
forward to returning to the
Doral this year.
“The venue is popu-
lar with our members and
it meets our needs,” said
CSFA CEO Dennis Shaul.
Under the Obama admin-
istration, the CFPB spent
close to five years work-
ing on a process to finally
nationalize the regulation of
the payday lending industry,
which is mostly regulated at
the state level. The bureau
started the process back in
2012 and its finalized rules
were finished in late 2017. It
was the last major pieces of
regulation done under Rich-
ard Cordray, the bureau’s
first permanent director,
before he left the bureau.
“I think this is a bad
development for consum-
ers,” Cordray said. “We
looked carefully at this
industry and there was a
common problem of bor-
rowers getting trapped in
long-term debt. We had put
together what I considered
to be a modest proposal. The
change is really disappoint-
ing and hasty.”
CFPB did propose keep-
ing one part of the payday
lending regulations: a ban
on the industry from mak-
ing multiple debits on a bor-
rower’s bank account, which
consumer advocates argued
caused borrowers hardship
through overdraft fees. In a
statement, the CFSA felt the
CFPB’s repeal did not go
far enough, and would have
wanted the regulations over
debits eliminated as well.
The proposed new rules
are subject to a 90-day com-
ment period by the public.
Parks: ‘A nice way to get the community engaged’
Continued from Page A1
said, it’s been great.
The Clatsop County Mas-
ter Gardeners have estab-
lished a garden at Alder-
brook Park. The Friends
of Birch Field and Park in
Alderbrook offered commu-
nity events last summer. The
tiny Post Office Park on 15th
Street remains trimmed and
well-kept.
“All the groups — there’s
such a wide variety in their
capacity — but they’ve all
been successful,” Dart-Mc-
Lean said.
A pause
The only new park adop-
tion since the slew that
occurred in early and mid-
2018 is the agreement with
the Scandinavian Heri-
tage Association to develop
a park celebrating Scan-
dinavian history at Peo-
ples’ Park off Marine Drive
downtown.
The parks department is
not actively pursuing more
park adoptions. Dart-Mc-
Lean and Tim Williams, the
new parks director, believe
park adoptions could con-
tinue to be a useful tool, but
the department will need to
be strategic in matching the
right project with the right
people.
“It definitely is a nice
way to get the community
engaged,” Williams said.
One agreement that now
has a proven track record
is the park adoption for
Tidal Rock the city recently
renewed
with
Jessica
Schleif, a gardener, artist
Clatsop Community College
A student works on the Custom House replica in 2018.
and Parks Advisory Board
member.
Schleif was one of three
artists who adopted Tidal
Rock last year after secur-
ing a grant from the Andy
Warhol Foundation for the
Visual Arts. The little park
became a nexus for volun-
teers who helped cut back
blackberries and plant
native plants. Schleif, with
artists Brenda Harper and
Agnes Field, hosted events
in a portion of the park they
found served well as a sort
of natural amphitheater.
Schleif hopes to continue
welcoming people down
into the park. She plans to
hold monthly work parties
beginning in April, but peo-
ple can just come to share
food and conversation. Her
focus will shift into devel-
oping the soil and helping
Hydropower: ‘Everybody knows these
are clean, renewable energy sources’
plants establish themselves.
“I feel there’s that com-
munity interest there and I
feel like it’s a great oppor-
tunity for another year to
intentionally develop the
land, showing what hand-
tool gardening can offer,”
she said. “That it’s pos-
sible to clear unwanted
plant material by hand,
mechanically rather than
chemically.”
Across town, near Safe-
way, another complex proj-
ect is underway.
Custom House
The Lower Columbia
Preservation Society signed
an agreement with the city to
take on the maintenance of
the Custom House, a recon-
struction of the first U.S.
custom house built west of
the Rocky Mountains, and
its surrounding parkland.
The small white structure
appears as a kind of after-
thought in the middle of
parkland, and few visitors
stop to see what it represents.
The preservation society
wants to bring more atten-
tion to it.
But when the organiza-
tion began taking a closer
look at the Custom House
with students from Clatsop
Community College’s his-
toric preservation program
last summer, they found the
building was in worse shape
than anybody realized.
Students assessed the
property and made some
repairs to the porch deck-
ing, siding and windows,
but the entire roof will need
to be replaced. There is spe-
cial chimney work needed
and deterioration on the west
side to address, said Rachel
Jensen, executive director of
the preservation society.
The Custom House was
built using traditional tools
and methods and, as a result,
will be more complex to
repair.
They are now looking at
a plan that will likely stretch
into spring of 2021, Jensen
said. In addition to repair-
ing the house, the organiza-
tion plans to landscape the
parklands — previous land-
scaping had been ripped out
— and increase the site’s
visibility through lighting
and signs.
The city already has inter-
pretive signs that do a good
job at telling the story of the
site, but, first, Jensen said,
people need to come visit.
College: Lab would be used by an
environmental sciences program
Continued from Page A1
Continued from Page A1
that count hydroelectric
power as renewable.
“Everybody knows these
are clean, renewable energy
sources,” Boone said. “Who
would have a problem with
that?”
But there are concerns
that allowing more hydro-
power could take the teeth
out of the state’s renewable
energy goals.
Rikki Seguin, policy
director for Renewable
Northwest, said there are
similar bills almost every
legislative session to count
more hydropower. While
the advocacy group believes
hydropower is renewable,
it opposes counting exist-
ing projects toward the
state’s renewable portfolio
standard.
“We really see Oregon’s
RPS as being meant to build
on our legacy of low-cost,
clean hydropower,” she said.
Brenna Visser/The Daily Astorian
State Sen. Betsy Johnson, D-Scappoose, right, introduced
a bill on behalf of retired state Rep. Deborah Boone, left, to
ease the requirements of including hydropower as part of the
state’s renewable portfolio standard.
Including more hydro-
power would effectively
allow the state to meet its
renewable energy goals, but
would negate the incentive
to develop more renewables,
such as wind and solar,
despite a growing demand
from customers, she said.
Tom Gauntt, a spokes-
man for Pacific Power, said
the utility is still research-
ing the hydropower bills
and has no position.
Washington state is con-
sidering legislation to elim-
inate coal energy by 2030
and require energy from
100 percent carbon-neutral
sources, including hydro-
power, by 2045. Fuel pro-
ducers and importers would
be required to reduce carbon
emissions from transporta-
tion fuels, among other cli-
mate initiatives.
“I don’t think we’re
planning on scaling back
at all,” said Christopher
Breitmeyer, the college
president. “We’re look-
ing at some other fund-
ing mechanisms and
talking to various enti-
ties to see what we can
do to make up for that
gap.”
The college is hope-
ful new legislation will
allow it to apply the pur-
chase price of the prop-
erty to the local match. It
is also looking at the New
Markets Tax Credit Pro-
gram, meant for low-in-
come communities and
used to help fund previ-
ous construction at the
college.
The college could also
get grants from the U.S.
Economic Development
Administration, used by
Southwest Oregon Com-
munity College to help
build a health sciences
building.
The State Land Board
also voted to begin due
diligence for a sale of
more than 100 acres on
the south side of Liberty
Lane to the Columbia
Land Trust.
The trust has secured
$1.3 million in state and
federal grants to purchase
the land, roughly encom-
passing the southern two-
thirds of South Tongue
Point.
The land would be
restored into salmon hab-
itat with help from the
Columbia River Estu-
ary Study Taskforce and
eventually transferred to
the college for use as a
living laboratory.
The lab would be used
by an environmental sci-
ences program being
developed by the college,
which could have classes
as soon as next fall in
surveying and research
methods,
Breitmeyer
said.
“We don’t need a
lot of infrastructure,”
he said of the program.
“Most of the courses have
been taught in the past.
Mostly it’s packaging
those courses in a path-
way, finding a four-year
partner (university) for
transfers.”
The college would
likely create two degree
tracks — one for field
biologists, and another
for environmental pol-
icy and law — along with
certificates in forestry,
fisheries,
environmen-
tal remediation and other
areas for people want-
ing to enter the work-
force sooner, Breitmeyer
said.