Colorado GOP payday gamesmanship stokes already hot partisan fires

DENVER– On Tuesday afternoon, Colorado Springs Republican Rep. Bob Gardner set off a firestorm on the House floor and in the Twittersphere when in the last hours of the 2011 legislative session he amended the annual rules bill to strip out regulations passed last year on payday lending. It was a surprise move sure to generate rancor and just the latest battle in the ongoing war over payday lending in the state.

Pro-payday lawmakers attempt late-session regulations roll-back

DENVER– The payday lending industry isn’t giving up on this legislative session in Colorado. Lawmakers who have failed at several attempts to roll back regulations passed last session limiting high payday interest rates and fees are now reportedly planning to attach to a bureaucratic rule-making bill an amendment that would thin the payday regulations. The legislative session ends at midnight tomorrow.

Bill to increase cost of payday loans dies in committee

A bill to increase fees on payday loans died Thursday, leaving consumer advocates happy and payday lenders less so.

‘Payday’ loan bill sails through House

Legislation changing last year’s consumer protection law governing deferred deposit lending passed out of the House Thursday morning after being scheduled in a breakneck, three-day sprint to passage. The Republican sponsor of the bill, Rep. Larry Liston, Colorado Springs, said House Bill 1290 instates a non-refundable origination fee that last year’s law was meant to contain. Mark Ferrandino, D-Denver, the sponsor of last year’s HB 1351, said the bill was never meant to have that provision.

Payday loan providers help introduce bipartisan bill to House

The battle over payday loan fees will strain partisan loyalties at the Legislature again this year as new legislation was introduced Friday in the House.

In debate, Garnett calls Suthers ‘attorney general for the tea party’

Candidate debates can be boring. Once in awhile, though, the fur flies.

That was the case yesterday in Loveland, according to the Reporter Herald, when the attorney general candidates squared off. Democratic challenger Stan Garnett accused Republican incumbent John…

AG’s Udis sides with consumers in payday rulemaking

DENVER — After four hours of testimony and deliberation in the old Supreme Court chambers of the state Capitol, First Assistant Attorney General Laura Udis decided to reverse her proposed payday lending rules and effectively reinsert consumer protections which…

Compromise payday lending bill passes Senate

DENVER– On Friday the state Senate passed a compromise version of Rep. Mark Ferrandino’s payday loan bill, which seeks to protect consumers against high interest rates and fees. Lawmakers fearing job-loss forecasts put forward by short-term loan industry softened the strictest limits the original version of the bill would have put in place. Ferrandino is confident the amended bill will pass in the House and head to the governor’s desk for signing this week.

New bank ‘payday loans’ sound watchdog alarms

As Colorado lawmakers wrangle over whether or not to regulate “payday loans” in the state, national mainstream banks are increasingly offering similar products– short-term, high-interest loans secured by a pending paycheck. That’s a bad thing, according to a consumer group that called on the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to stop the practice.

Lending business v. Plain old usury: Notes from the Colorado payday hearing

For six hours Monday in the packed Old Supreme Court Chambers of the Capitol before the House judiciary committee, lawmakers and lenders and borrowers traded stories and opinions on the payday loan industry in Colorado and whether and how it…