WASHINGTON—Both CUNA and NAFCU have expressed strong support for the proposed for Treasury’s Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) Fund and NCUA’s Community Development Revolving Loan Fund (CDRLF) in separate letters to the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee.
CUNA and NAFCU sent the letters ahead of the Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) hearing to examine President Joe Biden's fiscal year 2022 budget proposal, which includes $320 million for the CDFI Fund and $2 million for the CDRLF.
The CDFI Fund makes capital grants, equity investments and awards for technical assistance to CDFIs.
“The CDFI Fund uses small amounts of federal dollars to leverage significant amounts of private and non-federal dollars… The CDFI Fund is being used to grow local economies and serve the most economically distressed communities in the nation,” the CUNA letter reads. “Fully funding the CDFI Fund is a good investment by the federal government. Good paying jobs lead to more tax revenue and less dependence on the federal social safety net…The CDRLF usually receives requests that greatly exceed available funds and CUNA is concerned that an elimination of this fund will result in fewer low-income credit unions having access to needed capital to provide critical services to low-income credit union members.”
NAFCU’s Input
In NAFCU’s letter, Brad Thaler, vice president of legislative affairs, reiterated the trade association’s concerns about efforts to promote postal banking, as some organizations “continue to promote it as viable means of helping the postal service achieve solvency,” and offered support for increased funding for the community development financial institution fund and the community development revolving loan fund.
Under the new reporting requirements included in the proposal, financial institutions would be required to file an annual information return for all business and personal accounts with more than $600 in their account. The annual reporting requirement would include information related to gross inflows and outflows, including the amount of cash, transfers to and from accounts held by the same owner, and transactions with foreign accounts, NAFCU noted.