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April 16, 2013

NAFCU welcomes new exam fairness legislation

April 16, 2013 – Legislation to promote fairness in credit union examinations – a key component of NAFCU's five-point plan for regulatory relief – was reintroduced Monday in the House by Reps. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., and Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., and in the Senate by Sens. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.
The new bills are H.R. 1553 and S. 727, measures identical to one another and to the previous Congress' H.R. 3461 and S. 2160, offered by the same lawmakers during the 112th Congress.
Capito and Maloney are both on the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit, with Capito serving as chairman. Moran and Manchin are both on the Senate Banking Committee.
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Dan Berger
"We thank Reps. Capito and Maloney and Sens. Moran and Manchin for their continued commitment to ensuring fairness and consistency in federal examinations of credit unions," said Dan Berger, NAFCU's executive vice president of government affairs. "We look forward to working with all four lawmakers and their staffs to enact fairness legislation."
H.R. 1553 and S. 727 apply to NCUA, CFPB and federal bank regulators. The identical measures would:
  • require that financial institutions receive timely examination reports containing full documentation of the information relied upon by the agency in support of a material supervisory determination;
  • codify standards for examinations;
  • establish an Independent Office of Examination Ombudsman within the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council, a new path for institutions to appeal material supervisory determinations by their prudential regulator;
  • establish an appeals process before an independent administrative law judge.
NAFCU last year testified in favor of H.R. 3461, which drew 192 cosponsors.