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Following up on the bill they introduced Wednesday, Sens. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., and Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., on Thursday wrote CFPB Director Richard Cordray echoing NAFCU's call for a one-year delay in the bureau's revised Home Mortgage Disclosure Act rule.

The senators recommended a one-year delay – "at a minimum" – to Jan. 1, 2019, while the CFPB updates the HMDA resubmission guidelines and to allow Congress time to consider the Home Mortgage Disclosure Adjustment Act, which they introduced Wednesday. If that bill were enacted, depository institutions that have originated fewer than 500 open-end lines of credit and closed-end mortgages in each of the previous two years would be exempt from HMDA reporting and recordkeeping requirements.

NAFCU President and CEO Dan Berger thanked Rounds and Heitkamp for taking the extra step of seeking a delay in implementation of the 2015 HMDA rule as their bill is considered. "We thank Senators Rounds and Heitkamp for seeking this rule delay and for proposing the relief that many credit unions would experience if the Home Mortgage Disclosure Adjustment Act became law," said Berger. "NAFCU continues to support the rule's intended purpose of promoting fair lending and consumer protection, but concerns about the rule must be addressed."

In today's letter, the two senators note support for HMDA's focus on fair lending and equitable access to the housing market. However, they also note "this rulemaking has and will likely continue to play a substantial role in increasing the significant costs of regulatory compliance – taxing credit unions' and community banks' finite resources."

NAFCU has long urged the CFPB to use the authority it has under the Dodd-Frank Act to provide credit unions more exemptions from its rules. In May, Berger also urged the CFPB to delay the HMDA rule for one year.

NCUA Acting Chairman J. Mark McWatters echoed the call for relief in May, urging Cordray to use the Dodd-Frank exemption authority more and specifically highlighting the burdens presented under the 2015 revision to the HMDA rule.