[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 16080]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 MAIN STREET BANK CLOSES THREE BRANCHES

  (Mr. POE of Texas asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute.)
  Mr. POE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, last week I met with over a dozen 
community bankers in my congressional district. They are concerned for 
``the tsunami of regulations'' coming out of Washington, D.C.
  Now, these are not Wall Street bankers, these are small town bankers. 
They told me, ``Washington regulators have their feet on the throats of 
small community banks who did not cause this economic downturn.''
  The real life consequences of Dodd-Frank on our community banks 
impact our local small businesses, our communities' job creators. The 
reason is simple: Paying more money to comply with complicated, costly, 
meaningless regulations means fewer loans out the door for small 
businesses.
  Higher costs for compliance is why Main Street Bank in Kingwood, 
Texas will close three branches this week. It simply costs too much 
money to stay in the community banking business these days.
  When community banks close there are fewer opportunities for small 
business owners to access capital. I often hear small business owners 
say they can't get loans. This is why. These are the real consequences 
of burdensome, costly, ineffective Federal regulations.
  And that's just the way it is.

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