Proposed Collection; Comment Request

AGENCY:

Federal Housing Finance Agency.

ACTION:

60-Day notice of submission of information collection for approval from Office of Management and Budget.

SUMMARY:

In accordance with the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA), the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) is seeking public comments concerning an information collection known as “Community Support Requirements,” which has been assigned control number 2590-0005 by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). FHFA intends to submit the information collection to OMB for review and approval of a three-year extension of the control number, which is due to expire on March 31, 2020.

DATES:

Interested persons may submit comments on or before March 23, 2020.

ADDRESSES:

Submit comments to FHFA, identified by “Proposed Collection; Comment Request: `Community Support Requirements, (No. 2020-N-3)' ” by any of the following methods:

• Agency website: www.fhfa.gov/open-for-comment-or-input.
• Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments. If you submit your comment to the Federal eRulemaking Portal, please also send it by email to FHFA at RegComments@fhfa.gov to ensure timely receipt by the agency.
• Mail/Hand Delivery: Federal Housing Finance Agency, Eighth Floor, 400 Seventh Street SW, Washington, DC 20219, ATTENTION: Proposed Collection; Comment Request: “Community Support Requirements, (No. 2020-N-3).”

We will post all public comments we receive without change, including any personal information you provide, such as your name and address, email address, and telephone number, on the FHFA website at http://www.fhfa.gov. In addition, copies of all comments received will be available for examination by the public through the electronic comment docket for this PRA Notice also located on the FHFA website.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Deattra D. Perkins, Senior Policy Analyst, Division of Housing Mission & Goals, Deattra.Perkins@fhfa.gov, (202) 649-3133; or Eric Raudenbush, Associate General Counsel, Eric.Raudenbush@fhfa.gov, (202) 649-3084, (these are not toll-free numbers), Federal Housing Finance Agency, 400 Seventh Street SW, Washington, DC 20219. The Telecommunications Device for the Deaf is (800) 877-8339.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

A. Background

The Federal Home Loan Bank System (System) consists of eleven regional Federal Home Loan Banks (Banks) and the Office of Finance (a joint office of the Banks that issues and services their debt securities). The Banks are wholesale financial institutions, organized under authority of the Federal Home Loan Bank Act (Bank Act) to serve the public interest by enhancing the availability of residential housing finance and community lending credit through their member institutions and, to a limited extent, through eligible non-member “housing associates.” Each Bank is structured as a regional cooperative that is owned and controlled by member financial institutions located within its district, which are also its primary customers.

Section 10(g)(1) of the Bank Act requires the Director of FHFA to promulgate regulations establishing standards of community investment or service that Bank member institutions must meet in order to maintain access to long-term advances (i.e., loans with a maturity of five years or greater made by a Bank to a member). Section 10(g)(2) of the Bank Act requires that, in establishing these community support requirements for Bank members, FHFA take into account factors such as the member's performance under the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977 (CRA) and record of lending to first-time homebuyers. FHFA's community support regulation, which establishes standards and review criteria for determining compliance with section 10(g) of the Bank Act, is set forth at 12 CFR part 1290.

Part 1290 requires that each Bank member subject to community support review submit to FHFA biennially a completed Community Support Statement (Form 060), which contains several short questions the answers to which are used by FHFA to assess the responding member's compliance with the community support standards. Members are strongly encouraged to complete and submit Form 060 online, but may submit a version via email or fax if they cannot complete the submission online. In part I of the Form, a member that is subject to the CRA must record its most recent CRA rating and the year of that rating. Part II of the Form addresses a member's efforts to assist first-time homebuyers. A member may either record the number and dollar amount of mortgage loans made to first-time homebuyers in the previous or current calendar year (part II.A), or indicate the types of programs or activities it has undertaken to assist first-time homebuyers by checking selections from a list (part II.B), or do both. If a member has received a CRA rating of “Outstanding,” it need not complete part II of the Form. A copy of the current Form and related instructions appear at the end of this Notice.

Part 1290 also establishes the circumstances under which FHFA will restrict a member's access to long-term Bank advances and to Affordable Housing Program (AHP), Community Investment Program (CIP) and Community Investment Cash Advance (CICA) programs for failure to meet the community support requirements. It permits Bank members whose access to long-term advances has been restricted to apply directly to FHFA to remove the restriction if certain criteria are met.

B. Need for and Use of the Information Collection

FHFA uses the information collection contained in FHFA Form 060 and part 1290 to determine whether Bank members satisfy the statutory and regulatory community support requirements and to ensure that, as required by statute and regulation, only Bank members that meet those requirements maintain continued access to long-term Bank advances and to AHP, CIP, and CICA programs.

The OMB control number for this information collection is 2590-0005, which is due to expire on March 31, 2020. The respondents are Bank member institutions.

C. Burden Estimate

FHFA has analyzed the two facets of this information collection in order to estimate the hour burdens that the collection will impose upon Bank members annually over the next three years. Based on that analysis, FHFA estimates that the total annual hour burden will be 2,154 hours. The method FHFA used to determine the annual hour burden for each facet of the information collection is explained in detail below.

1. Community Support Statements

There are currently about 6,800 Bank members. Most of these are required to submit a completed Community Support Statement biennially, with members that are non-depository community development financial institutions (CDFIs) or that have been members for less than one year as of March 31st of the year submission is required exempted from the submission requirement. Based on the facts that there were 60 non-depository CDFI Bank members as of September 30, 2019, and that the average annual number of new Bank members system-wide was about 140 over the last three years, FHFA estimates that about 6,600 members will be required to submit the biennial statement over each of the next several cycles, which corresponds to an annual average of 3,300 respondents. FHFA estimates that the average preparation time for each Community Support Statement will be 0.65 hours. The estimate for the total annual hour burden on Bank members in connection with the preparation and submission of Community Support Statements is 2,145 hours (3,300 Statements × 0.65 hours).

2. Requests To Remove a Restriction on Access to Long-Term Advances

FHFA estimates that an annual average of 12 Bank members whose access to long-term advances and to AHP, CIP, and CICA programs has been restricted will submit requests to FHFA to remove those restrictions, and that the average preparation time for each request will be 0.75 hours. The estimate for the total annual hour burden on members in connection with the preparation and submission of requests to remove a restriction on access to long-term advances is 9 hours (12 requests × 0.75 hours).

D. Comment Request

FHFA requests written comments on the following: (1) Whether the collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of FHFA functions, including whether the information has practical utility; (2) the accuracy of FHFA's estimates of the burdens of the collection of information; (3) ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information collected; and (4) ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information on respondents, including through the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology.