I assume everyone here is familiar with the Move Your Money Project, an effort to convince people to close their accounts with big, national banks and switch their banking to local banks and credit unions. The Move Your Money web site includes a great tool for finding such institutions in your home town. It's a great idea, which helps to take down the Too Big To Fail banks a notch, and steer funds towards local institutions that are more responsible with their loans and services. But let's not forget, individuals are not the only ones who use banking services. So does your local government, and chances are, they have a lot more money in the bank than you do.
Below the orange squiggle thing - is it supposed to be a d and a p? - find a story about how the City of Lowell, Massachusetts is doing exactly that.
Here's what the Lowell Sun has to say:
LOWELL -- The city is gearing up to launch a program designed to boost the amount of money it places in local banks by millions of dollars in hopes of spurring small-business growth.
Devised by Lowell's chief financial officer, Tom Moses, the Lowell Economic Advancement Program, or LEAP, would shift up to $2 million in city deposits to each local financial institution headquartered in Lowell that agrees to lend the city money to Lowell-based small businesses. The money would be diverted from funds currently in nonlocal banks.
The initiative is modeled after a similar effort launched by state Treasurer Steve Grossman to transfer $100 million of state deposits in larger banks to local banks, with the goal of boosting small-business lending.
Their assertions to the contrary, I'm sure Bank of Screw You, Chump doesn't like to see someone with $8000 in assets take their business elsewhere. A few dozen such people, and now we're getting their attention. But millions of dollars in government deposits? Now we're talking!
Here's how Lowell's program would work:
The city's new deposit program is voluntary. To qualify, a Lowell-based bank must:
n Be on the list of banks qualified to do business with the state of Massachusetts.
n Have at least a satisfactory rating under the Community Reinvestment Act.
n Be adequately capitalized.
n Meet criteria under the city's investment policy.
Also, participating banks must publicize their small-business lending programs to the Lowell business community and file quarterly reports with the city. Banks can maintain their own loan-underwriting standards, but the loans to businesses should range between $10,000 and $500,000.
Folks, this is a win-win. Contact your City Councilors, Town Board, or whatever they have where you are, and let's see if we can take this Move Your Money thing to a whole new level.