Years after the financial crisis and reports that banks are deliberately not lending in predominately minority neighborhoods are still trickling in. According to an article in The New York Times, the city of Providence plans to files a suit against Santander Bank for just this.
“The attitude is, if we can’t do subprime loans, predatory loans in the black community, we won’t do any loans at all,” said John P. Relman, the lead lawyer on the case. “For us it is a civil rights issue.”
The lawsuit claims that between 2009 and 2012, the number of new mortgages made by Santander in white neighborhoods in Providence was 25 percent higher per year than it was in 2006 and 2007, while the number of new mortgages in minority neighborhoods declined by 63 percent.
