Want research on CRA?

Posted by on May 17, 2002

[Community Development Banking listserv]

I am hoping there is a fellow researcher who would be interested in providing a permanent home for what I believe is the largest collection of early Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) Performance Evaluations (PEs). I used these more than 5,000 exams to research my first book on CRA (see http://www.CRAHandbook.com). These were the very first banking exams ever to be made public in the U.S., and they were released starting June 1, 1990.

As many of you know, the FFIEC.gov and other sites do NOT have these early PEs, but only have the ratings, often the very first that came out for these banks. In some cases I don’t even think the regulators themselves have some very old PEs, as the FFIEC site does not reflect the first ratings for many banks. Most were collected in my several trips to the regulators but many from banks themselves. The ratings cover the years 90-93 mainly and all have been marked up with my notes from reading them. I would love to keep this collection but have just run out of room at my home where I keep them.

My collection represents 20 xerox boxes all organized by state for easy use (about 60 lineal feet is required for filing on the shelf). Within each xerox box are 4 labeled pamphlet boxes, one per state, and in some cases like TX, 3 or 4 boxes per state. Once placed on shelves, all other PEs can be added in each state box for easy reference.

I am hoping a community group or university or other research org with a budget for such purposes could pay for the shipping (probably a few hundred dollars) and make all prepaid arrangements with UPS to help save me time. Once I know who will be getting this portion of my CRA library, I will prepare a spreadsheet identifying all 20 boxes by states and weigh and number each one for UPS pricing and then seal them for shipping.

I am further hopeful that the recipient of this CRA collection will be able to make them available to other researchers as needed, and perhaps even arrange to have them scanned into the FFIEC or other database in the future so there is one single source for all PEs.

Please feel free to circulate this memo to anyone you may think might be interested.

Thank you,

Ken Thomas
voice 305-663-0100
website: http://www.CRAHandbook.com