Times Square Takeover/ Madison Ave Shutdown
A Day of Action: We Demand Medallion Debt Relief
What We Are Fighting For:
We are calling on lenders to restructure medallion debt to $125,000 and refinance for no more than 20 years at $757 per month (4% interest rate.)
We are calling on the City to use its power and resources to support our survival. If, after debt restructuring, the medallion is foreclosed due to non-payment by the borrower and auctioned for sale in a public auction, the city agrees to place a minimum bid equal to the balance of the loan at the time of foreclosure times 105%. (For example, if $80K remains at time of foreclosure, the City bids $84K) If the medallion is bought by a private party, the city loses nothing. The City would play this "backstop" role only for loans that are restructured to $125,000 and done so within 30 days after the city passes a law to play this role.
We also call on Congress to set up 0% interest loans and pass Congressman Gregory Meeks' bill (House bill 5617) for tax exemption on medallion debt forgiveness as part of the next stimulus package.
We recommit our demand to return foreclosed medallions in storage to the original owner at the same proposed terms.
We call on the NYS Attorney General in her lawsuit against the City of New York over its role in fraudulently inflating the value of the medallion to fight for $150,000 restitution for medallion owners over 62 years of age whose retirement was stolen when the market crashed due to city's role in predatory lending and failure to regulate App companies.
Statement from our Executive Director: Bhairavi Desai:
During the October 16th city council public hearing, the TLC Chair called lenders "partners," and described Marblegate's enriching offer of $300,000 a "resolution." The demands of owner-drivers who have been protesting, shutting down bridges, holding motorcades, fighting for their lives were not even mentioned. It's been made abundantly clear by the Mayor and the TLC that they would love for us to just go away, stop the protesting and agree to Marblegate so to not disturb the cozy partnership. This City Hall has gone from ignoring the pleas of drivers whose poverty the city is directly responsible for, to carrying the water for the hedge fund and the banks, without even the pretense of objectivity.
City Hall just doesn't get it: without this debt restructuring, there will be massive foreclosures and bankruptcies and the yellow cab industry will collapse. Thousands will lose their jobs, their homes, their life investment.
Lenders, meanwhile, are trying to pin down desperate owner-drivers into bad-faith deals, even as they write down loans. In its last quarterly call with investors, Medallion Financial Corp. disclosed that it has reduced the carrying value of non-accrual medallion loans to $119,500 (Medallion Financial Corp. FQ2 2020 Earnings Call, Dated August 4th, 2020. Page 4 Click here to download.) Lenders aren't banking on actually collecting money, they're just punishing their owner-driver borrowers.
Through our protests we will keep ringing the alarm for the city to wake up and the lenders to restructure debt and continue with payment holidays and suspend foreclosures. We're going to keep fighting until justice is served and owner-drivers win back their lives. We have a solution. And we have momentum. The city and lenders may not realize it, but every passing moment of silence, every act of sabotage and every attempt to punish is just fueling our fire to fight."
Driver Power…Union Power!