March 7, 2006

The Honorable J. Dennis Hastert
Speaker
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

The Honorable Nancy Pelosi
Minority Leader
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Speaker Hastert and Leader Pelosi:

America’s Community Bankers enthusiastically supports H.R. 3505, the Financial Services Regulatory Relief Act of 2005, by Representative Hensarling and Representative Dennis Moore of Kansas. This legislation takes concrete steps to relieve the financial services industry of the burden of laws that stifle innovation and increase the cost of credit to consumers and businesses.

We urge your support for this important legislation, which the House will consider tomorrow. We are pleased that many of ACB’s ideas for relieving unnecessary burden on community banks have been incorporated in the bill. Among ACB’ recommendations included in the bill are increased commercial and small business lending authority for federal savings associations, regulation of thrift trust activities in a manner comparable to bank trust activities, and an exemption from annual privacy notice requirements for financial institutions that do not share customer information.

We urge the House to support H.R. 3505. We appreciate your consideration of our views.

Sincerely,

Robert R. Davis
Executive Vice President and
Managing Director, Government Relations