A juggling act

The Republican leadership in both the House of Representatives and the Senate is taking a new look at almost everything about the way Congress operates, from committee structures down to the size of congressional offices. Two areas actively being reexamined by the new Congress are the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) and the Justice Department's enforcement of the Fair Housing Act (FHA) in recent lawsuits against mortgage lenders. Efforts to overturn CRA have not yet received serious attention, but legislative action is underway to lessen the extensive reach of the statute. In the last year, the FHA has taken on more prominence with the regulatory agencies because of the willingness of the Clinton administration's Justice Department to aggressively enforce the statute.