WASHINGTON–The acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said the agency will end the “pause” that has been in place around Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) reporting, CARD Act data collection and more.
The pause had been put in place under the agency’s prior leadership in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
In a post on a blog, Acting Director Dave Uejio said he is working to provide maximum flexibility for President Biden’s nominee for his post and that the Bureau will review past regulatory actions against how they fit with the bureau’s consumer protection mission.
Uejio said the CFPB’s Division of Research, Markets, and Regulations (RMR) will now take steps that include:
- Resumptions of data collections paused at the beginning of the pandemic, including HMDA quarterly reporting and the CARD Act data collection, as well as the previously completed 1071 data collection (on the cost to financial institutions of small-business lending data collection) and the ongoing PACE (Property Assessed Clean Energy financing) data collection
- Preparing an analysis of the most pressing consumer finance barriers to racial equity to inform research and rulemaking priorities
- Preparing an analysis on housing insecurity, including mortgage foreclosures, mobile home repossessions, and landlord-tenant evictions
- Explicitly including in policy proposals the racial equity impact of the policy intervention
Plans to ‘Adjust as Necessary’
In his directive, Uejio said the RMR should focus rulemaking on the pandemic response “and to preserve, where possible, maximum policy flexibility for the president’s nominee once confirmed.”
In addition, Uejio said he also plans to assess previous leadership’s regulatory actions and “adjust as necessary and appropriate those not in line with our consumer protection mission and mandate.”