The acting head of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) on Monday welcomed the Federal Reserve’s “joining us” in recognizing the need to “improve upon a system that was not working” through its issuance of an advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) under the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA).
The Fed Board on Monday issued an ANPR on an approach to CRA rules modernization, setting a 120-day public comment period that begins once the proposal is published in the Federal Register.
Acting Comptroller of the Currency Brian Brooks, appointed to the post following the departure of former Comptroller Joseph P. Otting just after the OCC’s release of a final CRA rule, said the OCC welcomed the Fed’s ANPR “on how to improve the CRA framework for state-chartered, Fed-member banks.”
“Public input and discourse fuels continuous improvement, and we look forward to reviewing the comments for potential insight into our own rulemaking that applies to national banks and savings associations,” Brooks said in his statement.
The OCC said its final rule issued in May (and not to take full effect until 2023) “reflects the thousands of helpful comments from stakeholders of all kinds on the ANPR and following Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that was issued with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation in December 2019.”
The OCC release omits the fact that the FDIC did not join with the comptroller’s office in issuing the final rule. The nation’s largest banking trade expressed some concern over the final rule, noting it still had questions.
RR: Fed Board, voting 5-0, rolls out ANPR on ‘approach’ to modernizing CRA rules (Sept. 21, 2020)
RR: Brainard: Fed’s CRA proposal seeks ‘consistent approach’ among banking regulators to strengthen rules (Sept. 21, 2020)