A bill that the City Council last summer proclaimed would make New York “the capital of responsible banking” has been stymied by inaction from Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Council Speaker Christine Quinn.
The new law, known as the Responsible Banking Act, called for Bloomberg and Quinn to appoint members to an advisory board that would examine the mortgage and lending practices of banks that hold the city’s money. The Council passed it over Bloomberg’s veto, after the mayor called the measure “a new low for idiocy.”
Despite a deadline that passed nearly seven months ago, both appear to have left slots on the board unfilled. And advocates who pushed for the bill now say that they’ve given up the fight until after the election of a new mayor in November— which will leave the advisory board scant time to deliver an assessment that’s due early next March.
“It’s incredibly disappointing that they’re not implementing this law that’s on the books,” said Jaime Weisberg, an advocacy associate at the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development, which spearheaded the bill. She added: “There’s going to be a new administration that has to follow it. So, we’re going to pick a battle right now, and it’s going to change in nine months.”
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Mayor Michael Bloomberg each has left a spot unfilled on a new board to oversee banks. AP Photo/Mark Lennihan
Under the new law, Quinn was required to make two appointments to a Community Investment Advisory Board, which would then examine banks’ local development initiatives to see how they were meeting neighborhood needs.
Quinn spokesperson Jamie McShane did not respond to a request for comment Friday. In October, he told the World that Quinn had made one of her selections: housing advocate Bernell Grier, a former director of community development for Fleet Bank.
The speaker’s second appointment, McShane added at the time, would be announced “in the near future.”
But Grier, in a telephone interview on Friday, said that the board has yet to meet, and that, to her knowledge, Quinn has failed to make a second appointment.
“I have been in contact with Quinn’s office to just say: ‘When are we getting started? What is going on?’” Grier said, adding that she has also suggested candidates for the post. “There are deadlines in terms of getting things started. But what I’ve been told is that those deadlines will probably be extended.”
Bloomberg was charged with making his own appointment to the advisory board — a representative of the city banking industry.
In October, McShane said that he was not aware of a mayoral appointment to the board. Julie Wood, a mayoral spokeswoman, did not respond to a request for comment Friday.
The board also will include representatives from the mayor’s, speaker’s and comptroller’s offices, as well as the commissioners of the Department of Finance and Department of Housing Preservation and Development.
If the appointments are delayed until after the mayoral election in November, the advisory board will have to work quickly to meet additional deadlines under the new law. By March 1, 2014, the board is supposed to have conducted public hearings in each borough, and have published a community needs assessment.
“I’m looking forward to being able to advance this overall regulation,” said Grier, Quinn’s lone appointee. But, she added: “I can’t have a committee meeting with just me.”
