Providing for Congressional Disapproval of Rule Submitted By Office of the Comptroller of the Currency Relating to ``Community Reinvestment Act Regulations''
Floor Speech
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Mr. HECK. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairwoman for introducing this important measure, of which I am a proud cosponsor.
This resolution is especially timely as we reckon with the legacy of discrimination in our country. In that process, we must consider how housing policy has contributed to systemic inequality.
For decades in this country, we allowed a Federal agency to legitimize racial discrimination by creating those color-coded maps indicating where investments would be profitable, ``greenlined,'' or where it would not be, ``redlined.''
We built institutional obstacles for Black families trying to purchase a home, and that resulted in devastating, intergenerational financial disadvantages.
Redlining prevented access to the single most important wealth- building tool an American has access to, that is, owning a home. The result? Black families have a median net worth of $17,000, compared to $171,000 for White families. In fact, homeownership by Black families is 44 percent, and by White families, 74 percent.
We have a responsibility to do everything we can to correct this. After all, we created it.
Yet, in the middle of a pandemic that has made racial disparities all the more pronounced, the OCC rushed out a final rule that undermined the legislation that made redlining illegal, and they even did it without the support of the Federal Reserve or FDIC.
The OCC's vague definitions and overly simplistic metrics do not do justice to what a crucial role homeownership and housing policy have played in racial inequality.
Their approach takes us backward. If you don't want to go backward, vote ``yes'' on this measure. If you believe homeownership should be available to all Americans, regardless of skin color, vote ``yes'' on this matter. If you oppose redlining, vote ``yes'' on this measure. If you want to stand for racial justice, vote ``yes'' on this measure.
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