InfoBytes Blog
HUD Reaches $200 Million Settlement Over Redlining Allegations
On May 26, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced that it entered into a conciliation agreement with a Wisconsin-based bank to resolve claims that, from 2008 to 2010, the bank discriminated on the basis of race and national origin by denying loans to qualified African-American and Hispanic applicants, and making few loans in majority-minority census tracts in five metropolitan areas in Illinois, Minnesota, and Wisconsin (while making loans in nearby predominantly white tracts). Among other things, the agreement requires the bank, over a three-year period, to: (i) pay nearly $10 million in the form of lower interest rate home mortgages and down payment/closing cost assistance to qualified borrowers in majority-minority census tracts in specified housing markets in Illinois, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, (ii) invest nearly $200 million in increased mortgage lending in majority-minority census tracts in these areas, (iii) provide nearly $3 million to help existing homeowners repair their properties in these predominantly minority communities, (iv) pay $1.4 million to support affirmative marketing of loans in these census tracts, and (v) open offices in certain specified majority-minority census tract areas. According to HUD, this is the largest redlining settlement that it has initiated.