Gov Approves HERO’s Act

Good morning folks, with a special shout out to those of you who work in the great state of New York.

The Governor has approved the HERO Act, legislation which mandates that all businesses in NYS implement policies addressing a wide range of issues related to airborne illnesses, such as COVID. For those of you with ten or more employees, you also must give your employees the option of creating committees to address work place health related issues on an ongoing basis.

The bill is phased-in over a six month period with the first requirements taking effect in 30 days. Adopting an approach similar to what we saw when the state passed sexual harassment legislation, the state will be providing sample policies that your credit union can adopt.

One other piece of good news is a reminder that this law applies to both federal- and state-chartered credit unions.

Stay tuned, the Association will be hosting a webinar next Wednesday to take a first look at this important new mandate.

Remote Notarization Hearing Today

At 10 o’clock today, the Assembly will be holding a virtual hearing to analyze issues related to authorizing remote notarization on a permanent basis in New York. Remote notarization refers to the ability of a notary to verify the authenticity of a signature without the signer being physically present. Lisa Morris from Hudson Valley Credit Union will be testifying for the Association.

He’s Back!

The former Benign Dictator of Consumer Finance is back. Ricard Cordray has been given a high profile job at the U.S. Department of Education from which he will oversee issues related to the federal student loan program.  Not coincidentally, his portfolio gives him a high-level platform to address one of the key issues the Biden administration is being pressured to address — whether to forgive or not to forgive all of those student loans — while not being so high as to require Senate confirmation.

California Chimes In

California joined  Illinois’s  financial regulator in prohibiting lending platform Chime from implying in its advertisements and websites that it was a bank as opposed to a lending platform that passes through loans. The state’s actions come as federal and state regulators continue to grapple with the issue of when FinTechs should be classified as banks with the accompanying regulatory requirements that this classification would impose.

Earlier this week the Federal Reserve board issued proposed guidance for the Federal Reserve banks to consider when deciding whether or not FinTechs should be given access to the Federal Reserve System. Don’t underestimate this power: remember it was a Federal Reserve Bank which blocked Colorado from starting a state-level bank to provide marijuana banking services.

Captain obvious here: this is an issue that Congress needs to address sooner rather than later.

On that note, enjoy your weekend. If all goes according to plan, yours truly will be gathering with a group of vaccinated middle age men to play his first round of in-person poker in more than a year.