Democrats In State Senate Urge For Foreclosure Moratorium
-
- May
- 14
From GNS reporter Dan Osburn:
The Senate Democrats urged the Republican majority today to bring legislation to the floor that would place a moratorium on foreclosures resulting from subprime mortgages.
“In the first quarter of 2008 the rate of foreclosures throughout the state has increased by 40 percent,” said Senate Democratic Leader Malcolm Smith. “Let’s keep people in their homes.”
Smith argued that the bipartisan legislation could prevent up to 125,000 foreclosures in the next year.
Without the moratorium and other reforms, foreclosures could result in an average property value decline of $18,000—leading to a $65 billion tax base decline, Smith said.
A subprime loan is made at a high rate, usually made by people who do not qualify for prime-rate financing.
The Legislature and governor have already set aside $25 million to provide grants for non-profits to counsel and provide legal representation people with subprime loans.
The Democrat-controlled Assembly passed a package of bills last week to tackle the subprime crisis, yet the Senate Republicans, who are in the majority, have not come on board.
This entry was posted
on Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 at 3:32 pm by Joseph Spector.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
Share and Enjoy: | 
Print This Post
| 
Email This Post
Jay Gallagher has covered Albany for Gannett News Service since 1984 and has been Albany Bureau chief since 1989. He`s a native of the Boston area and likes to point out that in this millennium, the score is Red Sox 1 championship, the Yankees 0. 
Cara Matthews has been a statehouse correspondent in the Albany Bureau since August 2005. Prior to that, she covered Putnam County government and politics at The Journal News for nearly five years. Before that, she worked at newspapers in Connecticut and covered the state Legislature for one of them. 
