So many employees of the payday lending industry in Ohio fought hard for their jobs and for their customers.  Everyone of you has more sense and smarts than the legislators who voted to kill the industry in the state.    This letter in the Youngstown Vindicator is typical of the many letters to the editors, emails to legislators and phone calls from employees over the last few weeks.

Ohio law kills payday loans

EDITOR:

Ohio House Bill 545 capping payday lending rates at 28 APR will close all payday lenders and put 6,000 Ohioans out of work. It will also leave hard working people no place to turn for a short-term loan. I am sure, if the members of the House and Senate spoke with our customers, their constituents, and actually listened to the masses, they would have a better understanding of how payday lenders can help our communities.

I am the Consumer Service Supervisor of Cashland Financial Services in Hubbard. Our customers come to Cashland for help for those unexpected expenses that hard working people can’t seem to get away from, i.e. car repairs, medical bills, and high utility bills or gas needed for driving back and forth to work. These are people with families and home mortgages who are struggling in the current economy and living from pay to pay.

Others use our services to counteract overdraft fees charged by their banks. They would rather pay Cashland $15 per $100 borrowed than pay a bank $37 or more for a bounced check.

People borrow from payday lenders like Cashland because, for many of them, there is nowhere else they can go to get the short-term loan they need. They come here because we are courteous and respectful and our services are private. We help ease their burdens; we don’t create them.

H.B. 545 (which has now been passed by the House and Senate) will not only close down payday lenders and put 6000 people out of work, it will close down the only means most hard working people, like myself, have for dealing with the unexpected expenses they incur.

KIMBERLY MANSELL

Hubbard