By: Jason Selmon
Sunflower Community Action
Wichita, KS
We all know that we don’t
always win at the first round of negotiations. That’s where
organizing happens.
One tactic is to go above the target's head. If involved in a bank
fight, you can use the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) to hold
the banks accountable by contacting banking regulators.
This is exactly what Sunflower Community Action did when we were
told by a representatives from Commercial Federal to take our concerns
to a file cabinet.
Commercial Federal has the highest rate of foreclosures in Wichita.
Further research found that the bank’s denial rate for Hispanics
was twice as high as the average denial rate in Wichita and that
Commercial Federal only made 89 loans to low- and moderate income
borrowers compared with 375 for middle and upper-income people in
the same time period.
Sunflower met once with representatives from Commercial Federal
after discovering the bank had the highest number of foreclosures
in Wichita. To get that meeting, we brought 40 leaders to the house
of a regional bank manager to demand that he call the Chief Executive
Officer, William Fitzgerald.
The regional manger, Roger Plugheoft told us that although he didn’t
like the way we went about getting the meeting, he would cooperate
with us and call Fitzgerald.
We met with Fitzgerald and other bank representatives and they committed
to work toward a partnership with us. But there were other issues
we had to address.
Considering their poor CRA performance, we wanted to push the bank
to do a better job in Kansas.
We contacted the CRA officer at Commercial Federal to tell her of
our findings and to say that we wanted another meeting. She responded
that Commercial Federal’s record was satisfactory and that
a meeting was not necessary. She told us to write a letter and the
bank would file it in their records.
After this conversation, we did indeed put a letter together. We
expressed our concerns about their data and requested that a meeting
be set as soon as possible. We also sent copies of this letter to
Theresa Stark at the Office of Thrift Supervision, which regulates
Commercial Federal.
Sunflower is well aware of the consequences that Commercial Federal
will face if they don’t get back to us. Commercial Federal
is well aware of these consequences as well, since we showed our
people power at Plughoeft’s house.
One issue led us to a bigger fight. We have now set the stage to
hold Commercial Federal accountable under CRA.
2004 NPA People's
Platform
Reclaim
quality jobs
Youth demand safe schools and
jobs
Family farms YES, Factory
farms NO
Make BIG banks work for US
Safe and secure neighborhoods
Build schools, fund IDEA and
NCLB
Immigrant children deserve a chance to DREAM!
Hold HUD Accountable
Ban Bad Lending
Stopping
the Credit Crooks
Also
in this issue:
*Sunflower
Brings 1,500 People to the State Capitol
NPA
action on HUD leads to local housing victories across the
*LNO
Turns the Heat Up on CTA President to Restore Night and Weekend
Train Service
*SUN
Wins $100,000 for Mortgage Prevention Program
*Speak
United Wins Victory Over Local Workforce Center
*ADP
Demands Justice from Mount Holyoke
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