• Employee Recruitment, Selection, and Placement
• Structural and Behavioral Interviewing
• Driving Employee Engagement
• Creating and Accountability Culture

• Human Resource Managers
• Branch Managers
• Department/
• Division Managers
• Management/
• Hiring/Coaching/
• Counseling

• A progressive coalition plans to push forward on a bill that would strengthen public banking in New York after the proposal fell short of passage during the legislative session. The NYS Community Agenda, which had supported the billl, will continue to urge legislators to approve the bill. The coalition achieved several legislative victories in 2021, including tax increases on upper income earners and the legalization of cannabis. "As the legislative session wound down, legislators once again tried to sneak through a bill that would have helped check cashers extract even more money from communities of color. Instead, the legislature should have been laser focused on policies that build wealth in hard hit communities, such as public banking," the group said. IBANYS opposed the establishment of a public/state bank for the reasons outlined in our Memo in Opposition.

• John Williams, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, said this week that the U.S. economy is not yet ready for the Fed to roll back aid. He noted the economy is "getting better all the time" but "the data and conditions have not progressed enough" to change the Fed's "strong support for the economic recovery."

• As the national economy recovers from the pandemic and begins to take off, New York City is lagging. The city has suffered deeper job losses as a share of its work force than any other big American city. While the country has regained two-thirds of the positions it lost after the coronavirus arrived, New York has recouped fewer than half, leaving a deficit of more than 500,000 jobs. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/20/business/economy/new-york-city-economy-coronavirus.html

• Budding small-business owners and companies that were shuttered during the pandemic can now tap into a New York City concierge service that promises to cut bureaucratic red tape and make it easy to open or reopen a business, the Staten Island Advance reports.

• With the state legislative session over, many bills are awaiting Governor Cuomo's signature or veto. Here are some of the bills Cuomo has signed into law since the last scheduled day of legislative session on June 10.

• State coffers are unexpectedly flush with cash as federal aid flows in and the economic recovery from the pandemic continues. 

• Governor Cuomo announced a new slate of administration appointments.

• In Buffalo, Mayor Byron Brown is trailing challenger India Walton, who appears to have won a stunning upset.
• In Rochester, scandal-scarred Mayor Lovely Warren failed to win the Democratic primary against Malik Evans.
• Syracuse Democrats are vying in an extraordinarily close race for the party's nomination to take on incumbent Mayor Ben Walsh, an independent. Republican Janet Burman will be waiting for Walsh and the Democratic victor in the fall. 
• In Albany, Mayor Kathy Sheehan's bid for a third term received a boost as she cruised to victory. 
• And in New York City, Eric Adams is leading, but ranked-choice voting could distribute more votes to his rivals in the coming days. "City & State" tracked the primary election results all night to provide the latest on the mayoral results, comptroller results, borough president results, Manhattan DA results, City Council results and upstate mayoral results.

• ICBA is calling on community bankers to urge Congress to oppose the Biden administration’s plan to require financial institutions to report customer bank account information to the IRS. ICBA’s Be Heard grassroots action center features a customizable message to lawmakers that community bankers can use to express opposition to new data-reporting requirements. Meanwhile, ICBA and 44 state community banking associations expressed staunch opposition to the proposal in a joint letter to the Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees. The American Families Plan proposes requiring financial institutions to report to the IRS on account flows, including bank loans, on accounts over $600. ICBA has strongly opposed the proposal since it was issued in April. In a recent LinkedIn article, ICBA Chairman Robert Fisher said the requirements would infringe on the privacy of bank customers, drive customers out of the banking system, and create complex new reporting burdens. CONTACT CONGRESS

• The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council released updates to four sections of the BSA/AML Examination Manual: 1) International Transportation of Currency or Monetary Instruments Reporting; 2) Purchase and Sale of Monetary Instruments Recordkeeping; 3) Reports of Foreign Financial; 4) Special Measures. The updated sections: Reinforce the risk-focused approach to BSA/AML examinations; Clarify regulatory requirements and include updated information for examiners regarding transaction testing. . .The manual provides instructions to examiners for assessing BSA/AML compliance programs and compliance with BSA regulatory requirements. LEARN MORE

• ICBA and other groups said they support the Biden administration’s decision to leave the Section 199A deduction for pass-through businesses intact and oppose any attempt by Congress to cap or repeal it. Section 199A, which is scheduled to sunset in 2025, includes a 20 percent deduction for qualified business income among pass-through businesses, including S-corporations. In a joint letter, the groups said Section 199A provides critical tax relief while limiting the deduction for larger pass-through businesses to those that have significant employment and investment levels. This targeted approach has spurred the introduction of the bipartisan Main Street Tax Certainty Act of 2021 (H.R. 1381 and S. 480), which would make the deduction permanent, the groups said.

• Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac completed 224,646 foreclosure-prevention actions in the first quarter of 2021, bringing the total during their conservatorships to 5.812 million, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The FHFA also said: 1) 38% of first-quarter loan modifications reduced borrowers' monthly payments by more than 20 percent; 2) The government-sponsored enterprises’ serious delinquency rate dropped from 2.78%to 2.48% at the end of the quarter, compared with 11% for FHA loans, 5.59%for VA loans, and 4.7% for the industry average.

• The White House is reportedly considering extending by one month a federal moratorium on evictions scheduled to expire on June 30, in an effort to buy more time to distribute emergency housing aid.

• With an unexpected budget surplus and federal stimulus money, California is planning rent forgiveness on a scale never seen before in the United States: A $5.2 billion program being negotiated in its state legislature would pay 100% of unpaid rent that lower-income Californians incurred during the pandemic, and would be financed entirely by federal money. California is also proposing to set aside $2 billion to pay for unpaid water and electricity bills.

• The Farm Credit Administration released its quarterly report on the ag economy and the performance of the Farm Credit System, whose growth is largely generated by tax free ag real estate lending. Gross loan volume has increased to $321 billion—a jump of 10 percent over a year ago—while total FCS assets exceed $400 billion. ICBA is encouraging community bankers to urge Congress to support the Enhancing Credit Opportunities in Rural America (ECORA) Act (H.R. 1977), which would exempt from taxation interest income on farm real estate and rural mortgage loans. IBANYS urged members of the New York congressional delegation to support this initiative in our discussions during the Capital Summit. . . Contact Congress now.

• ICBA reinforced its call for Congress to investigate tax-exempt credit unions acquiring taxpaying community banks following a resurgence in interstate acquisitions. The latest acquisitions: Lake Michigan Credit Union—a low-income credit union in Grand Rapids, Mich., with $10.4 billion in assets—is buying Tampa, Fla.-based Pilot Bancorp, a $656 million-asset institution that specializes in financing private airplanes. . .and, GreenState Credit Union in North Liberty, Iowa—a low-income credit union with $7.5 billion in assets—is acquiring community banks in Illinois and Nebraska worth $730 million in assets and $345 million in assets, respectively. ICBA President and CEO Rebeca Romero Rainey stated in a national news release: “These transactions—facilitated by a tax exemption that allows credit unions to make inflated purchase offers well above the book value of the acquired banks—are the latest to eliminate locally based lenders, further consolidate the banking industry, and cut regulatory safeguards for low- and moderate-income consumers.” ICBA is calling on Congress to: Hold hearings to review the role of the credit union tax exemption in fueling these transactions. . .and, Request a Government Accountability Office study on the evolution of the credit union industry and NCUA supervision. . .READ ICBA RELEASE

• ICBA recently published the Wake Up Messaging Playbook to provide ICBA members with guidance on effectively advocating a fair and level playing field between community banks and credit unions. The result of comprehensive market and opinion research to inform effective credit union messaging, the member-exclusive playbook provides candid insights from policy influencers, community bankers, and the general public on raising awareness of the credit union issue. The playbook and numerous other resources—including customizable communication resources, state-by-state reports on the credit union impact, and more—are available on ICBA’s Wake Up resource center.

• Federal financial regulators met earlier this week with President Biden. They discussed how to build on the economic turnaround. The regulators reported that the financial system is strong, financial risks are being mitigated by robust capital and liquidity levels, and household balance sheets are healthy. The regulators reported they were making steady progress on the president’s executive order on climate-related risk and discussed ideas for promoting financial inclusion and access to credit.

• The Federal Reserve helped unlock more than $2 trillion in funding to support businesses, nonprofits, and state and local governments during the pandemic, according to testimony from Fed Chair Jerome Powell for a hearing today. Ahead of today’s House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis hearing, Powell’s testimony notes that market conditions improved once lenders and investors understood that borrowers would have access to emergency loans.

• President Biden will reportedly quickly replace Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) Director Mark Calabria (which regulates Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac) after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling Wednesday gave him greater authority to fire the official. Biden is "moving forward today to replace Calabria, a Trump appointee, with an appointee “who reflects the administration's values." 

• The SEC tapped Renee Jones, a Boston College law professor, to lead the agency's division of corporate finance. She'll be the first Black woman to lead one of the four major divisions at the agency. Under its agenda, the SEC also said it will draft rules on environmental-, social- and governance-related investing in addition to disclosures by companies on cybersecurity risks.