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Ellen Belcher is the Dayton Daily News opinion pages editor. She writes about state government, education, the environment, higher education and all things Dayton.
Martin Gottlieb is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He focuses on the political process itself and does such national issues as war, the economy, taxes and Social Security, as well as a hodge-podge of local and state issues.Home > Blogs > A Matter of Opinion > Archives > 2010 > April > 26
Monday, April 26, 2010
Editorial: Payday lenders think they can ignore you
Ohio should be done with payday-lending scams.
Two years ago, lawmakers passed a law capping short-term loan rates at an annual percentage rate of 28 percent.
In November of that year, voters were asked whether they wanted to keep the new law. An overwhelming 64 percent said yes.
End of discussion, right? Wrong.
Within days, the payday people were back, setting up under different laws that were never intended to regulate their brand of lending. They zeroed in on loopholes.
One of them allows payday lenders to call themselves a “credit service organization,” which, in theory, is an outfit that helps people figure out how to get out of debt.
The payday lenders’ recommendations? Take out a ridiculously high-cost payday loan. How cynical is that?
The decision in Ohio to regulate this industry is not a fight between liberals and conservatives. Ohio’s law was passed by a Republican-controlled legislature that was decidedly business-friendly. After hearing both critics of payday lenders and industry representatives, Republicans concluded that the industry is peddling a destructive product.
Unsophisticated, low-income borrowers are coached into borrowing one loan after another, not grasping that every time they sign their name, they are paying more high-cost fees. Customers living paycheck to paycheck aren’t just delaying paying off debt; they’re spending money they don’t have.
Consumers have an obligation to know what they’re getting themselves into. But government also has an obligation to step in when it sees desperate people getting hosed. After all, if customers end up in the poor house, they’ll then be turning to the government for help.
For more than a year, critics of the payday industry have asked lawmakers to enforce the will of the people, to fight back against people who have mocked legislators’ decision to regulate them.
With just a few days left in the legislative session before the summer break, there’s a push on to pass a proposal that would do three things:
— Prohibit payday lenders from charging fees to cash the checks they sell to their customers. (Since they’re writing them, they know the money is there and that the check is not going to bounce; this is just another way to get around interest caps.)
— Limit origination fees and credit checks for loans of less than $1,000 to once every 90 days. (Currently, some lenders charge these fees as often as every two weeks, when borrowers pay one loan back and need another because there’s nothing left of their paycheck once they’ve paid back the previous loan.)
— Prohibit “brokering” of loans at the 28 percent cap, and then charging a fee for the service that can raise the real costs of the loan amount to as much as an annualized interest rate of 670 percent.
There’s no question that there are very many people who, now and again, need cash quickly to avoid costly overdraft charges, credit card late fees or cut-offs of their utilities. There should be a place for these people to turn in an emergency.
But these people are not really being helped if the assistance they’re getting locks them into loans that will eventually bring financial collapse.
When that happens, it’s the borrowers’ legitimate lenders and creditors who will get stiffed. The payday people will have been getting their fees and interest at every step along the way.
The Ohio House could — and should — vote on consumer protections as early as next week. Dayton’s delegation — state Reps. Terry Blair, Peggy Lehner, Clayton Luckie, Seth Morgan, Jarrod Martin and Richard Adams — needs to do what voters clearly thought they already did: rein in the payday people.
Permalink | Comments (16) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Ellen Belcher, Ohio government, Ohio politics
Editorial: Mesaros best pick in strong field for Greene County judge
2010 Election
Voters in Greene County have a difficult choice with three strong candidates running for judge on the Common Pleas Court. The best pick is David Mesaros.
Mr. Mesaros, 51, an acting judge in Xenia Municipal Court, has had an impressive and varied career as an attorney. Recruited to the Greene County prosecutor’s office from northeast Ohio by former prosecutor Bill Schenck to be his top assistant, Mr. Mesaros handled numerous criminal cases.
He’s since worked in private practice — including a stint at the Rion, Rion and Rion law firm — handling business, government and domestic relations cases. His opponents also have strong resumes.
Mike Buckwalter is a magistrate in the probate division of the Greene County Common Pleas Court. He is active in the political and legal communities in Greene County. Mr. Buckwalter, 53, is on the central committee of the county Republican Party and served as president of the county bar association in 2009.
He also worked for the Greene County prosecutor’s office. In private practice, his specialty is civil litigation, including personal injury cases.
Raymond Dundes, 59, is a magistrate in the general division of Greene County Common Pleas Court, where he has worked since 2001. He worked previously in the Montgomery County prosecutor’s office and in private practice. As a magistrate who served under retiring Judge Timothy Campbell, Mr. Dundes has performed many of the duties of a judge in the seat he is seeking.
The race has become bruising politically.
Mr. Mesaros was briefly removed from the ballot for a clerical error on his petitions — the start of the judicial term was listed as Jan. 20, 2011, rather than Feb. 9, 2011 — after Mark Humbert, a member of the county Republican Party central committee, objected to the board of elections.
The board’s decision to remove Mr. Mesaros from the ballot was overturned by an appeals court, which said the error wasn’t legally significant enough to disqualify him. Mr. Buckwalter, who serves on the central committee with Mr. Humbert, said he was unaware Mr. Humbert planned to object to Mr. Mesaros’ ballot. But the tension is there.
Mr. Buckwalter says Mr. Mesaros is exaggerating his experience on the bench with a claim of having presided over 36 jury trials as an acting judge. Mr. Mesaros acknowledges that all but three of those cases were resolved before a jury got the cases.
Mr. Buckwalter’s campaign mailings, which list him as a “life member of the NRA” and a believer in “the sanctity of life,” were criticized by Mr. Mesaros as inappropriate for a judicial race where the candidates are supposed to avoid taking positions on political issues that could come before their court.
Overall, complaints the candidates have about each other are not serious and amount to political sniping. The differences among them are not huge. Each brings useful skills and a range of experience that would be assets to the court.
Any of the three could capably serve, but Mr. Mesaros’ significant legal experience in a variety of important cases tips the balance his way.
NOTE: Read support letters for all the candidates here.
Permalink | Comments (7) | Post your comment | Categories: 2010 endorsements, Editorials, Miami Valley Politics, Scott Elliott, Suburban Communities
Editorial: Conner only possible choice to face Austria for Democrats
2010 Election
In a weak Democratic field of three candidates hoping to challenge Republican U.S. Rep. Steve Austria this fall — and ultimately represent Greene and Clark counties in Congress — Bill Conner is the best choice.
Mr. Conner, 66, a former Air Force officer, has run for this office before and displayed a temper and irritability that suggested politics might not be a good fit for him. Whether he’s mellowed, as he says he has, remains to be seen.
But in this race, Mr. Conner has the best grasp on the issues. His views are strongly liberal. He likened his position on health care to that of Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich, who held out for a “single payer” system and only signed on to the final bill when it was clear that the Democrats’ plan could go down and the status quo could prevail.
Mr. Conner also advocates stronger bank regulations, rescinding tax cuts for the wealthy from the George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan eras and reducing military spending. He would have voted for the federal stimulus bill, but against the 2008 bailout of the financial sector, arguing troubled banks should have been forced into bankruptcy and broken up into smaller institutions.
The other two candidates — Olivia Freeman, 54, a customer service representative who also has tried selling a primitive solar energy product on the Internet, and James John Barton, 63, who says he starts and sells companies, can’t be taken seriously. Mr. Barton wants to change patent laws in a way that he says would help keep jobs from going overseas.
Ms. Freeman says existing government programs needed to be better coordinated. She says she favored a public option but would have voted yes for health care.
Mr. Barton and Ms. Freeman are total novices; neither could handle themselves in such an important office.
For Democrats, Mr. Conner is the only possible choice.
Permalink | Comments (6) | Post your comment | Categories: 2010 endorsements, Miami Valley Politics, Scott Elliott, Suburban Communities
