UIN CDC 

UNITED INDIAN NATIONS COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION 

Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco 

101 Market Street 

San Francisco, California 94105 

RE: Nations/Bank of America Public Meetina Testimony 

The United Indian Nations Community Development Corporation (UINCDC) was incorporated in July 

1997 as a California nonprofit, Section 501(c)(3) tax exempt corporation (ElN94-3255859). The aim of 

the UINCDC is to develop housing and employment opportunities that are true lo Native Amertcan cutture 

and values to promote the economic and social well being for Native Americans in the San Francisco Bay 

Area. UINCDC has created an urban Indian initiative to acquire and develop property on closing 

military bases and other surplus federal lands that directly connect low-income communities to 

housing, employment, and revenue generating opportunities. This initiative is a model development 

mechanism that can be replicated by urban and rural Native American organizations to mitigate negative 

impacts on our community from historical federal policies. 

The Bureau of Indian Affairs’ Relocation Programs, initiated in the early 1995s and continued until the 

early 1970s created dramatic changes in the number and charader of American Indian population in 

urban centers. As a dired result of these federal programs, more than 85,000 American Indians moved 

from reservations to urban areas and many other followed to join their extended families or find better 

employment or educational opportunities. According to the 1990 US Census, which undercounts Indian 

people overall, more than 65 percent of American Indians now live in urban areas. In addition, urban 

Indian populations have historically been excluded from federal, state and foundation funding targeted for 

Native American projects located on, or linked through the provision of a service or product to a 

reservation, rural community, or tribal government. 

The San Francisco Bay Area Native American community is one of the largest and fasted growing Indian 

populations in the country. The 1990 US Census reported more than 40,000 Indians in the Bay Area. 

Although it is one of the smallest ethnic minority groups in the area, it is the third largest concentration of 

urban Indians in the United States. The demographic and socio economic stress of the Bay Area Indian 

community reflects the history that brought Indians to this area. These conditions exasperate the 

following socioeconomic and psychological problems which face the community: 

Fastest growing urban Indian population in the country The population has increased more than 

600 percent since 1960. Following from this the Bay Area has a disproportionately large and growing 

population of young people -- approximately 40 percent under the age of 25 according to the 1990 US 

Census. Considering, suicide is the second leading cause of death for Indian adolescents, the need 

to meaningfully engage this growing population in moving towards family self-sufficiency is our highest 

priority. In order to engage these individuals we have to raise educational levels. 

Bay Area Indians have considerably lower educational attainment levels than the general population. 

In 1990, nearly one in four American Indians had not earned a high school diploma or passed the 

1320 WEBSTER STREET l OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA 

94612-3204 

510/763-3410 * FAX 510/763-3646 
- - -. 

equivalency test and only 15.2 percent completed college, half the proportion of the general population 

(30 percent). With recent changes in affirmative action policies regulation California’s public universities it 

is likely that this number will decline. Following from this, we have to be prepared for unemployment rates 

to rise and poverty to persist. 

Unemployment rates for American Indians are higher than those for other Bay Area residents. In 

1990. nine percent of the community was unemployment, as opposed to 5 percent for the general 

population, Employed Bay Area American Indians. about 20,000 in 1990, tend to occupy blue-collar 

positions, very few are managers Overall, the Bay Area American Indian population has a dramatically 

low average income. In 1990, their per capita income was $14,034 compared with $19.629 for the area 

as a whole. The proportion of American Indian families living in poverty (11 present) was nearly twice as 

high as for all Bay Area families (6percent). Additionally, more than a third of Indian households headed 

by women were living in poverty (36 percent), compared to less than 20 percent for the total population. 

A low proportion of Bay Area American Indians own property and denial rates for American Indian 

mortgage lending has risen steadily. Only about 40 percent of American Indian households owned 

homes in 1990, compared to 57 percent of all Bay Area households. Denial rates for American Indian 

mortgage lending increased from 27.0 percent in 1993 to 50.2 percent in 1996. Furthermore. many 

American Indians spend, more than 35 percent of their income on housing costs. 

Considering these statistics, it is not surprising that a three-year Indian Health Service report to Congress 

completed in 1991 found that the health status of California American Indians was far below that of 

the rest of the population. High mortally rates, substance abuse, and health risks for infants and 

children combined with a lack of health insurance to create a health care crisis. 

UINCDC has acquired and is developing three significant projects in the East Bay: 

Unity Village: a transitional housing and supportive service project at the Alameda Naval 

Air Station 

American Indian Museum and Cultural Center: a regional educational museum at the 

Oak Knoll Naval Hospital 

United Oakland ECO Park: a community driven redevelopment project for a 220.acre 

eco-industrail park with an employment and training campus at the Oakland Army Base. 

In order for UINCDC to continue to revitalize our community and our neighbors in the East Bay, we need 

to have continued access to Bank of Americas levels and range of contributions for nonprofit 

infrastructure and continued support for projects that target very low-income urban communities. The 

Bank of American has been a positive CRA force in California, institutionalizing community reinvestment 

as a business through the Community Development Bank. Considerable expertise about community 

reinvestment as a business and about the needs of California communities has come to be housed at the 

Community Development Bank. Bank of America’s Rural Initiative 2000 has targeted funding to 

reservations and rural American Indian projects bringing significant new benefits to those undeserved 

communities. A merger with Nations Bank should augment the current benefits to low-income 

communities in California and bring additional funding and range of services for urban Indian initiatives 

without reducing the current grassroots services provided by Bank of America. Thank you. 

Sincerely, 

Sally Gallegos 

Executive Director 
. 

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE 

P.O. Box 907 l Stockton, California 95201-0907 _ 

Telephone: (209) 646-1669 

Fax: (209) 476-0725 

TESTIMONY OF 

ROBERT “ BOBBY “ BIVENS 

PRESIDENT NAACP STOCKTON BRANCH 

AND NATIONAL BOARD MEMBER 

PRESENTED BEFORE THE 

FEDERAL RESERVE BANK BOARD 

NATIONS / BANK AMERICA PUBLIC HEARING 

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA 

JULY 9,199s 
Presiding Offtcer, Members of the Panel, my name is BobbyBivens and I am a member of the National Board of Director’s and 

President of the Stockton California Branch of the National 

Association for the Advancement of Colored People, generally 

known as the NAACP. I appreciate the opportunity to come 

before this body today to give testimony expressing concern and 

opposition for the public record regarding the proposed acquisition 

of Bank America Corporation by Nations Bank Corporation and 

to quote our Chairman of the Board of Directors the Honorable 

Julian Bond “ bank mergers need to be opposed when the banks 

do not address the specific needs of minorities and the poor”. 

The NAACP was founded in 1909 and we are the oldest civil 

rights organization in America with over 200 units in California 

and over 1700 units across this nation and in several countries 

abroad. The NAACP has a long history of fighting for civil 

rights, economic and community development and self 

sufftciency for A&an Americans, other ethnic minority groups 
and all disenfranchised people in America. While we remain 

focused on our founding principles we have in recent years taken a 

more aggressive and proactive approach to achieving economic 

and community empowerment. 

Some of our concerns are: 

l The $350 billion announcement, while an impressive sum, 

nonetheless lacks the specificity and targeted lending, service and 

investment components needed in a full community reinvestment 

commitment. More specifically, it does not address the critical 

needs of California communities. 

l The Banks have refused to make a specific and meaningful 

written commitment to California. They have verbally told me as 

a National Board Member representing the NAACP for the State 

of California and the Stockton CA. Branch and members of the 

CRC in meetings that they are allocating approximately $70 

billion to California - the same $70 billion already allocated to this 

state under 1997’s Bank of America $140 billion lending goal. In 

order words, the Banks have not committed one additional penny 

to California, the state that will be the most impacted by this 

merger, that will lose the headquarters of its largest bank and that 

will see that Bank’s successful community reinvestment program 

dismantled. 

l No written commitment to provide specific products and 

services targeted at the unique needs and priorities of California’s 

diverse regions and people. 
l There is no written commitment to establish a “floor” goal, or 

targeting, for lending in this area the Central Valley of California 

for small businesses, nor any commitment to target loans or lines 

of credit of $50,000. or less to small minority owned businesses. 

l There is no written commitment to prioritize nonprofit housing 

developers, who will keep housing developments at the greatest 

level of affordability for the longest period of time. 

l Nations Bank has a CDC which develops its own housing 

developments. The California Branches of the NAACP is 

concerned that, were it to tinction in a similar manner here in 

California, it would conflict directly with the state’s thriving 

infrastructure of non-profit housing developers. In negotiating 

meetings with the Banks, the California State Conference of the 

NAACP with CRC members have requested of the Nations Bank 

that they only do investment and lending, but no development, in 

California. Nations Bank has categorically refused to make such a 

commitment. Although the NAACP has a ongoing relationship 

with Nations Bank with our Community Development Resource 

Centers (CDRC’s) in other regions of the country, that does not 

have any impact on us in California, nor has Bar&America been 

agreeable to the establishment of a similar program in California. 

l There is no written commitment to continue Bank of America’s 

program of appointing a liaison to the community on Fair Housing 

issues. 

l There is no written commitment to establish a secondary review 

process for declined consumer loan applications from minority and 

low income census tracts. 
l There is no written commitment to develop program to provide 

venture capital to Minority Owned Businesses, especially those 

located in distressed and Rural areas. 

l There is no evidence to adopt or commit to any written goals for 

purchasing a certain percentage of the goods and services it 

consumes in California ii-om Minority Owned Vendors in 

California. 

l There is no written commitment to continue Bank of America’s 

existing agreement to 1) not close or consolidate any branch 

located in a low-income market as a result of the consolidation or 

closure of a Bank of America Branch. 

l There is no written commitment to ensure that Minority 

employees will not be disproportionately affected by consolidation 

and branch closures. 

l Bank of America’s reinvestment program known as the Bank 

America Foundation may be dismantled and may be integrated 

into the central corporate structure in Charlotte. 

l There is no written commitment to contribute a percentage of 

the Bank’s earnings, either specifically to California or even in the 

$350 billion announcement. This is out of step with every 

community reinvestment commitment has been negotiated and 

fought for by the NAACP. 

l Finally regarding the bank’s internal structure, the NAACP is 

extremly interested in the diversity goals regarding senior 

management and the governing board of directors. If the 

merger is approved and as the proposed new bank solidifies its 

diversity goals, objectives and policies, the NAACP will 
continue to be a resource and monitor the financial institutions 

internal structure envolvement. 

Regarding the proposed acquisition of Bar&America 

Corporation, the NAACP California State Conference of 

Branches, and Myself as a elected Member of the Board of 

Directors from California stand ready as resources to ensure that 

certian goals are met and matters are not overlooke, if a merger of 

the two institutions goes forward. We are extremly concerned 

about consumer protection, competition and economic expansion. 

Successful and effective mergers are to lower costs, improve 

product quality or enhance efftciences. The proposed new bank’s 

commitment to $350 billion in community development lending 

and investment over the next ten years is an indication of an 

expected enhanced delivery of services resulting from the merger. 

350 billion represents the largest community development 

commitment ever announced by a financial institution. This is an 

opportunity for organizations like the NAACP to challenge this 

bank and an opportunity for the new bank to live up to a bank’s 

chartered role as an economic leader in communities. 

Again thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. 
National Associalion 01 Development Organizations 

444 North Capitol Street, NW, bile 630 n Washington, DC 20001 

202-624-7606 n FAX 202624-6613 

email nado@sso.org n home page www.nado.org 

TESTIMONY 

OF 

CHUCK PRINCE 

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 

OF THE 

SOUTHEAST IDAHO COUNCIL OF GOVERNMENTS 

POCATELLO, IDAHO 

ON BEHALF OF THE 

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF 

DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATIONS (NADO) 

BEFORE THE 

FEDERAL RESERVE BANK OF SAN FRANCISCO 

ON THE PROPOSED MERGER OF 

NATIONSBANK CORPORATION AND 

BANKAMERICA CORPORATION 

JULY 9,1998 

SAN FRANCISCO, CA 
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today on the proposed merger of NationsBank 

Corporation and Bar&America Corporation. My name is Chuck Prince, and I am the, 

Executive Director of the Southeast Idaho Council of Governments and a member of 

the National Association of Development Organizations, or NADO. 

I am here today to express NADO’s conditional support for the proposed merger. 

NADO is a national association of regional development organizations serving rural and 

small metropolitan America. The association, a public interest group founded in 1967, 

provides its members with training, information, and representation, and has been a 

leader in promoting the interests of America’s frequently forgotten small towns and rural 

regions. 

Regional development organizations are multi-county planning and development 

districts that pool otherwise thin local resources across a region and are catalysts for 

cooperation between citizens and the public and private sectors. Most of America’s 

rural areas and small towns, which are home to some 77 million people, are served by 

regional development organizations. One of the most important functions of these 

organizations is managing revolving loan funds that serve the credit needs of small, 

high risk businesses that cannot obtain a loan on their own through a private 

commercial bank. Often these revolving loans funds are the only available noncommercial source of credit, so they play an important role in economic development. 

2 
‘. 

This brings me to the focus of our concerns and conditional support for the proposed 

merger. The most compelling reason we feel this merger should be approved is the 

$350 billion/ten year commitment to community development lending made by Nations 

Bank - Bank of America on May 20, 1998. Simply put, this commitment is extraordinary 

and will have a long reaching impact, both in communities served by Nations Bank - 

Bank of America and in establishing a benchmark for future bank mergers. 

However, even with the $350 billion commitment, we believe the merger should be 

approved with very specific conditions: 

1. First, that the Bank of America Community Development Bank be retained and 

expanded in both mission and function. The Community Development Bank is 

unique. Its vision statement, which reads in part: “to support community growth 

and prosperity by being the catalyst for or by forming public/private partnerships 

for funding,” has lead directly to a work program which loaned over $560 million 

for affordable housing in 1997. The Community Development Banks great 

success is partially attributable to its outreach to the non-profit housing 

development network as a pool of partners and borrowers And, recognizing that 

affordable housing lending requires specialized skills, many of the Community 

Development Banks’ 300 staff were recruited from this non-profit network. The 

NationsBank-BankAmerica Corporation $350 billion commitment includes $115 

billion for affordable housing. The only logical steward and conduit for these 

funds is the Bank of America Community Development Bank. 

3 
2. Second, using the Bank of America Community Development Banks affordable 

housing development activities as a template, the merged bank should create an 

entity dedicated solely to community economic development. Just as the 

Community Development bank has reached out to non-profit housing 

development corporations for affordable housing partnerships, this new entity 

should reach out to the community economic development network including 

regional development organizations, for business and job creation ventures. 

Only by making an organizational and structural commitment to community 

economic development will the merged banks’ actual lending and investments 

come close to matching the promises of its May 20, 1998 press release. 

3. Third, we commend the NationsBank-Bank of America $10 billion commitment to 

rural America. We ask that the purposes of this rural pool be sufficiently broad 

to include financing for community facility and infrastructure improvements. 

Many small cities, special districts and counties often find it difficult to finance 

city halls, jails, water and sewer systems, community centers and streets. 

Participation of the new Bar&America in meeting these credit needs would be a 

valued contribution in efforts to better rural America. 

4. Fourth, the merged bank has also pledged $180 billion for small business 

lending and $25 billion for economic development. To say that these are 

substantial amounts of needed capital is a gross understatement. However, we 

4 
are concerned that the lion’s share of these funds will be used for government 

insured loans. While these loans are an important tool in job creation efforts, 

they truly represent little risk to the bank and only serve a narrow spectrum of the 

needs of the small business credit continuum. In order for these funds to have 

the greatest impact we believe a portion of these funds should be targeted 

towards: 

1. 

2. 

3. 

4. 

5. 

Direct loans to higher risk borrowers including business start-ups; 

Investments in and grants to the revolving loan funds of regional 

development organizations; 

Creation of an accessible secondary market for loans made by regional 

development organizations through their revolving loans funds; 

Development of venture capital pools at regional development 

organizations and other regional and multi-state intermediaries; and 

Creation of a set-aside for small business lending and investment in rural 

and small metropolitan communities for ventures of any size. A recent 

NationsBank-Bank of America publication calls for only making loans to 

ventures creating more than 25 jobs in rural or lower and moderate 

income communities. This limitation is artificial and simply doesn’t reflect 

the reality of job creation in rural America where 3 and 4 employees 

ventures are the rule and 25 employee ventures, the major exception. 

5 
Only by adding these higher risk type activities in with the safety of government insured 

financing will the merged bank begin to approach meeting the credit needs of small 

business. 

In conclusion Mr. Chairman, NADO conditionally supports this merger. As stated at the 

outset, the $350 billion commitment to community development lending and investment 

is unprecedented. However, translating funding commitment to real impact requires a 

focused plan of action. The plan should contain: 

1. 

2. 

3. 

4. 

Retention of the Bank of America Community Development Bank; 

Creation of an equivalent to the Community Development Bank, focusing 

on community economic development; 

A vision of the community development needs of rural communities broad 

enough to include infrastructure finance; and 

An approach to small business and economic development lending that 

features a rural set-aside and a mix of both government insured and nontraditional higher risk loans and investments. 

Thank you for allowing me to speak to you today. I will be happy to answer any 

questions or provide additional information. 

6 
National Association of Development Organizations 

444 North Capitol Street, NW, Suite 630 n Washington, DC 20001 

202-624-7806 n FAX 202-624-6813 

email nado@sso.arg n home page www.nado.org 

1 i 

Training, in/ormation and representnrion /or regional deuelopmenl organizations serving small mefropolilan and rural Amrrica