Payday lenders batting .500 on ballot petitions
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
COLUMBUS Payday lenders got a hit late last week after a few strikes, but they're a long way from winning.
Lenders say they are fighting for their jobs, and that's why they are trying to get at least one referendum, and maybe two, on the November ballot to overturn House Bill 545.
The legislation, among other things, puts a cap on short-term loans, lowering interest rates from an annualized 391 percent to 28 percent. The new law goes into effect Sept. 1, which is also the deadline for getting 241,365 signatures on petitions to overturn it.
Last week wasn't a particularly good one for the Reject H.B. 545 Committee, but it's still in the game.
State law, which has been in effect since 1930, requires the attorney general to review and approve petition language before signatures can be collected. She has 10 business days to do that once the language is submitted.
Attorney General Nancy Hardin Rogers rejected the committee's first attempt June 19, saying the petition language was not a fair and truthful explanation of the legislation. So the committee came up with new language, twice.
One petition eliminates the entire law, and the other eliminates the portion that caps rates.
The committee contended that Rogers impeded the public's constitutional right to consider a referendum.
It asked a Franklin County judge for a temporary restraining order against Rogers, saying it couldn't wait for the her to approve or disapprove the new language before starting to collect signatures. The judge disagreed.
On Thursday, Rogers again rejected the language that would repeal the entire law. She grudgingly approved, however, the language to block part of the law, saying it was truthful but "inherently confusing to prospective petition signers."
"We are still reviewing our legal options on the rejection of the second summary language," said Kim Norris, a spokesperson for the committee.
It may be better to advance the runner (referendum) the committee has on base than try to get two runners in action.
Ohio's 1,600 payday lenders say the law will force them to close, their employees will lose their jobs, and people needing short-term cash would find their supply cut off.
Without the law, supporters say, borrowers get trapped in a cycle, needing new loans to pay off old ones.
"Don't be fooled by the lenders' insistence that they want to maximize customers' choices," said Bill Faith, executive director of the Coalition on Homeless and Housing in Ohio. "All they want to maximize is their profits and voter confusion."
"Let consumers decide," Norris said.
Faith's group is tracking petition circulators and their message. Game on.
Source : http://www.cantonrep.com
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