The Independent Community Bankers of America (ICBA) recently expressed its support of several bills that address the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s proposal to implement new data collection and reporting requirements for small business loans.
“While ICBA supports the CFPB proposal’s goal of expanding access to credit for minority-owned, women-owned, and small businesses, we are concerned that its overly broad coverage will disadvantage community bank business customers,” ICBA President and CEO Rebeca Romero Rainey said. “These newly introduced bills from Reps. French Hill, Blaine Luetkemeyer, and Roger Williams will help ensure the CFPB tailors its Dodd-Frank Section 1071 rule to mitigate unintended consequences for small-business customers.”
The three bills that ICBA supports include:
- The Small Lenders Exempt from New Data and Excessive Reporting Act, introduced by U.S. Rep. French Hill (R-AR), would expand the 1071 proposal’s community bank and small-business exemptions while extending its implementation period to allow covered entities to hone their systems.
- The Business Loan Privacy Act, introduced by U.S. Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO), would require the CFPB to conduct a rulemaking on proposed modifications and deletions to loan data the bureau will publish, allowing the public to weigh in.
- The Preventing Racial Profiling in Lending Act, introduced by U.S. Rep. Roger Williams (R-TX), would eliminate the proposal’s requirement that loan officers guess the race or ethnicity of small-business credit applicants.
ICBA has also sent a comment letter calling on the CFPB to exempt more community banks and small businesses from its proposal to limit the impact on small-business lending.