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Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and House Democrats are planning to move ahead with a Friday vote on a $3 trillion package to respond to the coronavirus crisis, Politico reported. President Donald Trump and Senate Republicans also object to the Democratic proposal, saying that there hasn’t been enough time since the $2 trillion CARES Act passed to determine whether new legislation is needed or necessary. Democrats released their sprawling package, known as the Heroes Act, on Tuesday afternoon. The legislation includes $875 billion for cash for state and local governments, which Democratic leaders say is the centerpiece of this coronavirus relief package. It also includes $20 billion each for tribal nations and for U.S. territories. The measure also includes provisions to support multi-employer pensions. The legislation also includes a slew of liberal priorities left out of previous bills, including $75 billion for mortgage relief and $100 billion in assistance for renters, $25 billion for the U.S. Postal Service and $3.6 billion to shore up elections. The bill goes further than previous bills in other ways, too: It would include another round of $1,200 checks for adults making up to $75,000. Under this bill, kids would receive the same amount, instead of $500. It would make $10 billion available to small businesses that haven’t received funds from the Paycheck Protection Program. Republicans dismissed the bill even before the text was public, calling it a Democratic wishlist that would not move in the GOP-controlled Senate. Read more.

In related news, Congress is looking to help struggling local newspapers, TV and radio stations qualify for federal coronavirus aid, the Wall Street Journal reported. The coming coronavirus legislation expected to be introduced in the House as soon as this week will include a provision to expand newspapers’ and broadcasters’ eligibility for forgivable small business loans, the people said. Meanwhile, Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) are working to find ways to move the proposal forward in the Republican-controlled Senate. “The Covid-19 crisis has shown us how essential local news and information is to us,” Cantwell said. “Now is not the time to cut newsroom jobs critical to giving the public regional data and news on Covid-19 outbreaks.” Many local news outlets haven’t been able to apply for the Small Business Administration’s forgivable Paycheck Protection Program loans because of “affiliation rules” that force them to be measured by the size of their parent companies. The new provision to be considered by Congress would waive such rules when it comes to local news outlets. Read more. (Subscription required.) 

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has come to a settlement with Specialized Loan Servicing LLC (SLS), a mortgage-loan servicer based in Colorado, NationalMortgageProfessional.com reported. The consent order requires SLS to pay $1.275 million in monetary relief to consumers in the form of redress and waiver of borrower deficiencies, pay a $250,000 civil money penalty, which will be paid to the Bureau and deposited into the Bureau’s Civil Penalty Fund, and implement procedures to ensure compliance with the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA) and its implementing regulation, Regulation X. The CFPB’s found that since January 2014, SLS violated RESPA and Regulation X by taking prohibited foreclosure actions against mortgage borrowers who were entitled to protection from foreclosure, and by failing to send or to timely send evaluation notices to mortgage borrowers who were entitled to them. These violations also constitute violations of the Consumer Financial Protection Act of 2010. In some cases, SLS’s violations of Regulation X short-circuited the protections against foreclosure for consumers whose homes were ultimately foreclosed upon.

Americans increased their borrowing for the 23rd straight quarter to a total of $14.3 trillion, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the latest snapshot of household balance sheets entering what many experts believe to be a recession, Bloomberg News reported. Total U.S. household debt rose by $155 billion in the first quarter from the previous three-month period, or 1.1 percent, the New York Fed’s quarterly report showed. Overall household debt is now 28.2 percent above the second-quarter 2013 trough. The steady increase in consumer borrowing has continuously set new records with every passing quarter, but still remains shy of the inflation-adjusted $15 trillion that Americans owed in 2007, New York Fed data show. Mortgage borrowing rose by $156 billion to $9.71 trillion. More than 80 percent of mortgage originations were among borrowers with a credit score of at least 720, the highest percentage in seven years. The median Equifax Risk Score — in which lower scores indicate that a consumer could become seriously delinquent — rose to 773.

MacMurray College survived the Civil War, the Great Depression and two world wars, but not the coronavirus pandemic. The private liberal-arts school in central Illinois announced recently it will shut its doors for good in May, after 174 years, the Wall Street Journal reported. Like many small schools, it faced declining enrollment and financial shortfalls. To lure prospective students, it was using steep discounts to its $30,000 listed tuition. Then the global health crisis brought unexpected costs for shifting classes online and partially reimbursing room and board for students forced to finish out the spring term at home. The loss of a $3-million-plus bridge loan was the final straw. From schools already on the brink to the loftiest institutions, the pandemic is changing higher education in America with stunning speed. Schools sent students home when the coronavirus began to spread, and no one knows if they will be back on campus come fall. Some colleges say large lecture classes and shared living and dining spaces may not return. Athletics are suspended, and there is no sense of when, or if, packed stadiums, and their lucrative revenue streams, will return.