Before Ms. Parell presented her views on regu­latory reforms, she outlined her department's ef­forts, despite the limitation of a civil (rather than criminal) enforcement process, to oversee the check cashing industry. She gave official chronol­ogies of her department's activities in coping with examples of criminal and regulatory misconduct by check cashers and their clients that were re­vealed at the hearing. Her presentation indicated to the Commission that the regulatory system's purely civil law framework was inadequate and that certain check casher activities had to be proscribed as activities subject to criminal law sanctions.

Wants More Than "Fine-Tuning"

Ms. Parell told the Commission her department hoped that more than mere "fine-tuning" rec­ommendations would result from the SCI probe and hearing. Although she conceded that law re­visions to prohibit check cashers from handling checks payable to businesses and a limitation on the amount of a check that they could process could be "really major" changes, she said that she-along with Deputy Bank Commissioner Rob­ert Wagner, Consumer Credit Bureau Chief Joseph Lanigan and the departmental deputy at­torneys general and staff lawyers-were "prepared to offer a conceptual framework," in­cluding several options, upon which to base regu­latory and statutory revisions. Her prefatory com­ments generated an exchange of views with the SCI panel. For example, Commissioner Barry H. Evenchick recalled that Gerald Goldman, counsel to the New Jersey Check Cashers Association, had claimed in his statement to have submitted a number of complaints to the Banking Depart­ment about the prevalence of unlicensed check cashers:

COMMISSIONER EVENCHICK:... I recognize that much of what Mr. Goldman says ... predated your time [in office], but have you had the opportunity to look into the records to see whether such complaints had been dealt with and, if so, in what way?
WITNESS: Yes. I don't think that I can give a totally complete answer but I am aware of at least one occasion where the check cashing association identified for us five or six names which they alleged to be conducting un­licensed check cashing activities. Two of those were licensed, two of them were Gallagher op­erations and one of them-I believe one-was an unlicensed location that we were not aware of ... Then we asked the complaining licensee, a member of the association, to as­sist us in coming up with some provable stuff, but it didn't go anywhere. Most recently, sev­eral weeks ago we did a sweep, I guess you would say, of six locations alleged by a licensed check casher in their vicinity to be conducting unlicensed check cashing ac­tivities. Two thousand dollars' worth of exam­iner time produced not one single indicator that any check cashing for a fee was going on ... I'm sure there have been other instances where Mr. Goldman and his association in­deed have communicated with us.

"The Hard Work of Reform"

Ms. Parell proposed a number of options for reforms of the regulatory system, "the hard work of reform," as she put it, beginning with the con­ception that check cashers should be licensed only "to serve individuals:"

WITNESS: Option one-concentrate regu­latory attention on licensees to serve individ­uals. Here you would prohibit licensees from cashing checks payable to business and checks above a certain dollar amount. I would prefer a lower dollar amount than $2,500, maybe $1,500, with specified exceptions like the New York law has. You would make licens­ing of [a check cashing] business much easier. It wouldn't take me a year and a half to process those licenses if you reduced the entry criteri
A. However, you have to answer the question that for the other checks floating around in this State that aren't going to be presented at banks, those above $1,500 and those payable to businesses, where are they going to go? And should we ignore it, deregulate it or crimi­nalize it? It's very difficult to decide whether just to push those checks into the underworld and ignore them or to address that before decriminalizing it-and it will be difficult to de­tect once you have, as a matter of public.pol­icy, written them out of the New Jersey check cashing statute.

CHAIRMAN PATTERSON: Another thing that would happen is you [would divert] them from New York [and] New Jersey to Pennsylvania, where they have no regulations.
WITNESS: And certainly, though, something is happening in New York which is causing the problem to get pushed into New Jersey ... Another option I think that even responsible people must consider is full deregulation of the function of cashing a check for a fee. You know, 47 states do not regulate this area and much of the testimony that we have heard has been directed to the fact that if you legitimize check cashing for a fee, then you are providing a legitimate vehicle for the unscrupulous to abuse, pervert, and perpetrate criminal acts. It's really something to consider. I don't think it would be in the best interests of the citizens of this State, though, especially not those who have a legitimate need for a check cashing service in their neighborhoods at a reasonable fee.

COMMISSIONER EVENCHICK: May I interject a question at this point? Is it within the authority of your Department to require the banks of New Jersey to provide a check cashing service for the consumer that every­body agrees needs that kind of service from some place?
MS. PARELL: No ... [A] bill comes up in our legislature every year as it does in the Con­gress to require banks to cash government checks for nondepositors. Here in New Jersey, if we should do it, it would affect only the State­chartered institutions ... So there's no easy solution to this problem ...

Ms. Parell only briefly mentioned her third op­tion, which would be such a "heavy handed regu­lation of check cashing" that she probably would never be able to issue a license. From this ex­treme she moved to what she described as a "two­tiered style of regulation:"

WITNESS: The first tier would be your average retail-type check cashing service-limited size of checks that could be paid, no business pay­ees, and we would-we would streamline the licensing criteria, make it easy to [be licensed] ... No question [but] that we can regulate for consumer compliance and we can prevent the overcharging by the use of receipts and [use of a] hot line, which we have already installed ... Then on the second tier would be the full license category such as we have now. We would still be regulating every single trans­action of cashing a check for a fee in the State ... and that [process would involve] strengthened licensing criteria and civil and criminal penalties.

"Create a New Category of Crime"

WITNESS (continuing):... a fourth option that might get at this widespread problem of the utilization of check cashing for criminal purposes [would be] to create a new category of crime in New Jersey which would be written into our criminal code and actually made a part of our law enforcement process ... My Department could do what it does well, which is to examine, and when we would see one of these indicators of criminal activity, we would get criminal law enforcement authorities in­volved. I would use my Special Investigation Unit, which I am installing for the purpose of developing to the point where it [and] criminal enforcement authorities would work together in [an] investigation. Now, if the criminal aspect could be addressed in that manner, then the licensing policy it seems to me could be addressed in terms of the consumer, which is where it belongs. We would ask what would promote maximum availability of check cashing services in communities at minimum cost? Well, at that point, we could actually en­courage people to take out licenses to cash checks for a fee and in order to encourage them we would simplify the licensing criteria and weed out a lot of our record keeping re­quirements ...

Commissioners Seek More Details

As Ms. Parell's presentation ended, the Com­mission sought additional data on some of the specific proposals she cited, including a limitation on the amount of a check that could be processed through a licensed check casher:

CHAIRMAN PATTERSON: Thank you, Com­missioner Parell. I want to explore just for a minute the possibility of putting a dollar limit on a check to be cashed. Is there in your mind some figure where any check over that amount is clearly not the kind of a check that should be taken to a check casher to be cashed?
WITNESS: Yes, indeed, the average check in this state is $250. Most government benefits checks vary in a range from $200 to $400. A payroll check submitted by a person likely to use a check casher would probably be in the $250 to maybe a $500 range, if that. The New York law has exceptions for insurance checks, bank checks, government checks of all sorts and certified checks. I would like to see [the limitation] really quite low. I think $1,500 with those exceptions would be good ...

BY COMMISSIONER EVENCHICK: It strikes me from what I've heard during these three days that, except for those situations that you've just alluded to, it isn't the business that needs the check casher, it's the individual who needs to be able to cash his $200, $100 check quickly and conveniently. It wouldn't trouble me in the least to see a regulation that would simply bar the cashing of business checks or checks made out to businesses.
WITNESS: They're considering that in New York right now to make it part of their statute.

COMMISSIONER EVENCHICK: That would take New Jersey out of the realm of the attract­ive place to go ...
WITNESS: Would you be willing to criminalize that? It would [otherwise] be very hard for a regulator to enforce.

COMMISSIONER EVENCHICK: Well, it would seem to me that, when we listened to Chief Dintino and the IRS people and so forth, the organized crime problems need to be ad­dressed in every way we can, and I'm all for criminalizing violations of the law ... There is nothing in the criminal law right now [to permit prosecution of] people who are doing the things that we've heard are going on.
WITNESS: I'm quoting the testimony that was quoted by Mr. Dintino." They are the "wise guys."

COMMISSIONER EVENCHICK: And I'm all for getting a law on the books as soon as possible that will enable the appropriate prosecuting authorities to go after those people.

Return to the SCI Check Cashing Industry 1988 Report Main Menu

Great New Bike Lock!
$25 – Lock Included – Free Shipping in the USA
Payment by PayPal – E-mail bikelock@geltbyassociation.com

Domains For Sale – Web Sites For Sale

Craig Guy Hudson County Technology Schools Aide to Senator Bob Menendez Convicted Drug Dealer Connection?

Hudson County Hate Monger Hal Turner charges in suit: "Criminal activity . . . includes photographs of pre-teen and teenage girls in various states of undress."

Drunken Jamie, Jersey City's Own Howard Stern Character

Is there voting after death? Hudson County Politics

Bret Schundler's Big Win

City Hall Web Wall City Hall puts one Web site off limits Web site's owner: Why ban just me?

New Jersey Fact: "New Jersey is a small state on the eastern seaboard halfway between Honest John Lindsay and the Liberty Bell. It is best known for its turnpike, Atlantic City, Imamu Baraka, Newark Airport and the Morro Castle disaster. Most of its leaders are in jail for stealing money...." Over thirty years ago, this was how a New York Times writer described New Jersey. The only things that have changed are that now Bloomberg has Lindsay's old job and Amiri Baraka figured out somewhere along the line that it's not too swift for an atheist to use a religious title.

Visit PoliticalPredator.com

Jim McGreevey vs. Bret Schundler The 2001 Race for Governor of New Jersey

Page continues BELOW this image! For All Sorts of Unique New York City Information, Visit GET NY!

Brooklyn Politics: Due to the tireless efforts of Brooklyn District Attorney Charles "Joe" Hynes,
the people of New York City remain safe from that gang of marauding political reprobates – Sandra Roper, John O'Hara, and Judge John Phillips.

The Trail of the Tiger – Tammany: 1789-1928 Boss Tweed and The History of New York City Political Corruption

United States Of America V. Robert Philip Hanssen The FBI Agent Who Spied for the Russians

Now on Sale at Amazon

Hudson County, New Jersey is a place of many firsts - including genocide and slavery.
Political corruption is a tradition here.
First issue in a series by Anthony Olszewski – Click HERE to find out more.

Print Edition Now on Sale at Amazon Read Online at Google Book Search Advertiser and Distributor Inquiries Welcome

The Advance-Decline Line As A Tool In Technical Market Analysis