Mark Winston Griffith

Subprime Mortgage Crisis: The View from Washington D.C.

I'm writing this entry from Washington D.C. where I am attending the National Community Reinvestment Coalition annual conference. Today's NCRC sessions feature a series of conversations on addressing the foreclosure crisis that includes remarks from Fed Chair Ben Bernanke and Sheila Bair, Chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). Bair has emerged as arguably the most forward thinking of the federal regulators and helped lead a national discussion on freezing adjustable rate mortgages at their teaser rates as a way of saving homeowners from financial ruin.

Bernanke and Bair address a room full of community development professionals and economic justice advocates on the heals of a speech by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Jr. that proposes modest, but encouraging economic activism from the Bush Administration around the subprime mortgage meltdown.

According to the New York Times, "The changes include tougher disclosure requirements for banks and Wall Street firms, a nationwide licensing system for mortgage brokers and new rules for credit rating agencies, which have been widely criticized for failing to recognize major problems with mortgage-backed securities and for having potential conflicts of interest."

Solutions to the foreclosure crisis are going to have to come from every possible direction. Given how long it has taken for Washington to respond, let's hope regulators, the Bush administration and legislators are finally ready to act.

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Posted at 8:00 AM, Mar 14, 2008 in Economic Opportunity
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