Projo 7 to 7 News Blog

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Legislation to create an 180-day moratorium on all foreclosures in Rhode Island has been taken off the General Assembly's agenda -- at least for now.

A hearing scheduled on the bill, 2009-S 0250, for Tuesday afternoon was canceled at the request of its lead sponsor, Sen. Charles J. Levesque, D-Portsmouth, Bristol, after bank and mortgage company lobbysts agreed to work with him and the bill's other supporters during the next two weeks to draft alternative legislation.

The moratorium was an "emergency measure" designed to give the General Assembly time to craft legislation to require judicial review of foreclosures and give at-risk homeowners time to renogotiate their loans.

"The moratorium was a very dramatic statement of concern," Levesque said, "and it has had the effect we wanted it to have: The lending institutions are speaking with us."

Another bill, 2009-S 0606, to require Rhode Island Housing Mortgage & Finance Corp. to wait five years before selling any properties the agency buys at tax sale, also was taken off the table Tuesday pending alternative legislation. (The tax-sale bill, introduced by Sen. Harold M. Metts, D-Providence, was designed to give the original owners more time to reclaim the property.)

Lobbysts for the mortgage and banking industry have agreed to work toward drafting more comprehensive legislation to address the "plethora of foreclosures" and the tenants who are being forced from their homes because their landlords are losing the properties, Levesque said.

The parties will have until the General Assembly goes into recess in mid-April to come up with alternative legislation, Levesque said, or the foreclosure moratorium bill could be back on the table.

 Tags  Rhode Island General Assembly

Comments

tom said:

I believe all lobbyists should be band for working in this state.That way the politicians would work for the people not the man.

Link | March 24, 2009 6:52 PM
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