House Financial Services Lawmakers Introduce GSE Overhaul Bill

WASHINGTON—House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, along with Reps. Richard Baker (R-LA), Mel Watt (D-NC) and Gary Miller (R-CA) Friday introduced bipartisan legislation to overhaul the regulatory oversight of the government sponsored enterprises (GSE) of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Banks. The legislation, H.R. 1427, the “Federal Housing Finance Reform Act of 2007” will create a new, independent regulator with broad powers analogous to current banking regulators. In addition, the bill creates an off budget and non-taxpayer financed affordable housing fund, which will dedicate hundreds of millions of dollars for the construction, maintenance and preservation of affordable housing with the first year of the fund to be dedicated to the hurricane stricken areas of the Gulf Coast. Additionally, a subcommittee of the full financial services panel today is holding a hearing on the status of the nation’s secondary mortgage market.