Supervisors Want Crackdown on Loans

Sun Herald
August 16, 2010
Nelson, Karen

Jackson County, Miss., supervisors have declared their support of state laws to stop payday lending practices that exploit the area's low-income and desperate people. According to Jackson County Supervisor Melton Harris, the legislation is aimed at loans with payback terms as short as two weeks and interest rates that translate into an annual rate in the triple digits. There is a need for short-term loans with lower interest rates, but the existing predatory loans are hurting "people looking for a quick solution to their problems," said Harris. County supervisors in Jackson and Harrison County are urging state legislators to let the laws allowing high-interest loans to expire in 2012 and then cap annual interest rates across the state at 36 percent. In data compiled by the Mississippi Center for Justice and the Mississippi Economic Policy Center, Mississippi in 2007 had one of the nation's highest concentrations of payday lenders in the nation. Supervisors are also asking that the state prohibit the use of a personal check and set the minimum repayment period to 90 days. They are also requesting a statewide database to track the loans.
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