PORTLAND, Ore - The Oregon State Public Interest Research Group (OSPIRG) is working to pass local city ordinances to stop ATM surcharge fees in Eugene, Salem, and Portland. The group is modeling the effort on ordinances passed in Santa Monica and San Francisco last year. Those bans are currently being challenged in the Ninth Circuit Federal Appeals Court. The Salem City Council discussed this issue in a February 14 meeting, but split 4-5 on whether to ask their city attorney to draft an ordinance barring the fees, according to John Valley, consumer advocate for OSPIRG. OSPIRG has formed the "Campaign to Ban ATM Surcharges," and is working with the press to get their message out. Valley said cities in Oregon are currently waiting for a decision on the court cases before proceeding, but OSPIRG is currently conducting educational campaigns in Eugene and Portland to help the issue get on city council agendas. "Nothing is being drafted yet, " he said, "but we are in contact with the mayor's office in Portland." Portland is not anxious to get into another legal battle while it is in the middle of a controversial case regarding their insistence that AT&T's cable television division open its system to other cable television companies. In Eugene, one city councillor has said she will attempt to get the issue on the agenda, but the city manager and mayor have to agree as well. "We are monitoring them closely," said Pam Pifher Leavitt, vice president of governmental affairs and public relations of OSPIRG's activities for the Oregon Credit Union League. "We are concerned with local governments imposing these broad restrictions. While many credit unions do not surcharge, we believe in the free market and in letting financial institutions set their own fees." There has been no action from the Oregon CU League Governmental Affairs Committee yet, she said, but credit unions in Eugene, the city most likely to consider such an ordinance, have been alerted. Oregon credit union leaders want to be heard by city councils if the subject is brought up, Leavitt said. Oregon's state attorney general has issued an opinion letter saying there is local authority to adopt such ordinances, Valley said. Several other state AGs have filed amicus briefs in the Santa Monica and San Francisco cases in favor of prohibiting charging fees to use ATMs. Currently, Valley said, both California cities are forcing financial institutions that do charge fees to put the proceed in an escrow account pending a court decision. The public interest group was founded by Ralph Nader several decades ago as a way for college students to work on public policy issues. The Oregon organization has broadened to include the non-college population and now has two sections, both with the acronym OSPIRG: the Oregon Student (or State) Public Interest Research Group. They have a combined membership of 25,000. -
mcintyre@viclink.com
