by Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book Substack
SOUTH BRONX/Federal Court, Nov 15 – A proposed acquisition by Ohio-based Park National Bank of First Citizens of Tennessee after Park National's redlining settlement, and deteriorating record since, have given risen to a challenge under the Community Reinvestment Act.
On November 15 Fair Finance Watch, reviewing Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data of Park National for 2024, filed a CRA challenge to the merger with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency:
Beyond the lending disparities preliminarily identified below, Park National is one of the few banks with a redlining settlement. See, United States v. Park National Bank (S.D. Ohio), 2:23-cv-00822-EAS-CM It also has troubling consumer complaints against it. Fair Finance Watch is requesting an evidentiary hearing. On the current record, the application to buy First Citizens must be denied.
Fair Finance Watch has long been concerned about Park National. Now we find that even after their settlement loudly announced to the redlining complaint, Park National has not improved.
As it seeks to expand further, consider its 2024 lending, not reviewed in any Community Reinvestment Act performance evaluation.
In North Carolina in 2024, The Park National Bank denied four mortgage applications from African Americans while making fewer, only two loans - while it made fully 71 loans to whites and denied only 11 applications. This is disparate.
n South Carolina in 2024, The Park National Bank made 166 mortgage loans to whites, with only 49 denials, while making only 14 loans to African Americans with fully 10 denials. This is disparate.
Even in its home state of Ohio in 2024 The Park National Bank made 2648 mortgage loans to whites, with only 721 denials, while making only 218 loans to African Americans with fully 55 denials. This is disparate.
Here for the record are just some of the many complaints against Park National Bank: Ashland, OH ... I used to work here. I finally had to move on because I couldn't deal with the drama and backstabbing. Fair warning: this bank allows workplace bullying and childish behavior. Co workers whisper and talk about other co workers, they are passive aggressive and cliquey. Even the supervisors will join in! I witnessed many of my associates go through this and I experienced it myself at times. This doesn't just happen internally! Every branch I worked at, the staff would talk about customers and make fun of them. [On what grounds?]
The Village of Indian Hill, OH Terrible Customer Experience! Any bank is better than this! I am opening a new business, hence a new business account. I walked up to teller and stated that I want to open a Business Account. Teller said, we'll be with you in a minute. I sat there more than 20 minutes. Made eye contact with almost all 6 tellers and a person sitting on the desks outside of counter and none of them followed up with me or the people sitting on desks.
FFW and Inner City Press note in the FDIC's pending proposal RIN 3064-AG10: "the FDIC has received a limited number of public comments in response to subpart C applications.... Therefore, the FDIC is proposing to eliminate the public notice and related public comment period from subpart C and to make conforming changes to subpart A of 12 CFR part 303 of the FDIC Rules." See, e.g., American Banker, Sept 10, 2025, "The FDIC is taking the 'community' out of CRA enforcement," by Matthew R. Lee, here.
And now the OCC is following suit in trying to cut out the public. The above-quoted reasoning is that few comments are filed. So, that is now changing
Watch this site
***
Your support means a lot. As little as $5 a month helps keep us going and grants you access to exclusive bonus material on our Patreon page. Click here to become a patron.
Feedback: Editorial [at] innercitypress.com
