MIAMI—The City of Miami has voluntarily dismissed lawsuits against Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase, in which the city alleged discriminatory practices under the Fair Housing Act (FHA) that indirectly harmed the city, resulting in lost property tax revenue and increased municipal expenses.
The case had been pending before the Supreme Court.
“Miami’s move to dismiss the cases voluntarily came as a surprise to the banks, sources close to the situation say. There are no settlement talks ongoing, and Miami had just received the court’s permission Jan. 21 for a filing extension on an updated complaint in the Wells Fargo case, according to the court docket,” Bloomberg Law stated.
“The dismissal was initiated by the city and is not related to a settlement, and Wells Fargo is providing nothing in exchange,” Wells Fargo said in a statement.
The City of Miami was one of several municipalities that sued Wall Street banks for alleged violations of the Fair Housing Act after the 2008 housing and financial crisis. The cities alleged that the banks steered black and Latino homeowners into mortgages they could not afford, leaving local governments on the hook for lost taxes and the costs of maintaining foreclosed properties, Bloomberg explained.
The City of Miami filed its lawsuits against San Francisco-based Wells Fargo and Charlotte, N.C.-based Bank of America in 2015. Those cases were dismissed, but revived by the U.S. Supreme Court in a May 2017 decision that allowed cities to bring Fair Housing Act claims against the banks, but raised doubts about their tax revenue claims.