September 15, 2010, GRO – Grass Roots Organizing with a few MORE leaders, some SEIU labor brothers and sisters joined up in downtown St Louis at the Bank of America. The group of forty-plus who attended was there to support our National People’s Action report—The Predators’ Creditors that expose how the Wall Street banks support and affiliate with the legal loan sharks who make up the payday loan industry!
Link to report: http://showdowninamerica.org/files/payday-final-091410.pdf
Robin Acree, GRO Director opened up the news conference to congratulate those who went to the Heartland Showdown, April 27 in KC—where we all first exposed Bank of America’s huge investments in Quik Cash Holdings—the biggest payday loan operator in Missouri! On June 30, 2010, Bank of America divested from Quik Cash as a result of grassroots direct action (over 150 people went up 15 floors to QC’s corporate suite). She stated that there are no good payday lending stores! It is criminal what they are boldly and blatantly able to do to our defenseless families, friends and neighbors! Wells Fargo, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, US Bank, Banco Popular and Wachovia shame on you!
One GRO leader who is a former payday loan worker spoke out against his former employer Advance America, “Much of the business came from making loans to those relying on small, fixed payments from social security and disability. We were required to come in early on the third day of every month (the day electronic social security and disability checks came out) so that we could be at the local banks when the doors were opened and could beat our customers who were late on their payments to their money. We would then call them up later and ask them if they wanted to come back in and take out another loan, which was the only way some could get through the rest of the month.”
Fenny was one of the people these payday employees were trained for and supposed to target. She told reporters that she receives SSI disability payments and stated she was “trapped in a cycle of addictive borrowing and mounting debt” for nearly twelve years!
Another GRO leader who is a full-time student and pizza delivery driver was victimized by the payday loan. Jennifer exclaimed, “Do you know how many pizzas I have to deliver to even make $300? Yet, I bailed out the big banks they bounced back and they recovered! While they invest in these shady lenders to allow me to borrow my own money back for over 400% interest!”
GRO gave those attending a simple and lively audience participatory explanation of the bailout using posters and people as visual aids —Big Banks borrowed our money from the FED at 0% interest, Bank of America funds predatory lenders for $$$, legalized loan sharks charge us 400% interest—They Got the Money & We Get the Bills!!! The group then began chanting, “Who got the money, money—they got the money, money—we got the BILL!
The event concluded when GRO leaders delivered a letter to a Bank of America employee—named Joe. Police were very cooperative. But the police stood guard protecting corporate America (who we are definitely shaking up) from the rest of us using our tax-payer money, too!
We got media coverage from the Huffington Post, St Louis Post-Dispatch, St Louis American (pending) South East Missourian, and
Dangerous Intersection
http://dangerousintersection.org/2010/09/16/grass-roots-groups-big-banks-are-quietly-profiting-from-payday-lending/
GRO Holds Banks Accountable at STL Bank of America
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