Payday Loan Bill Cashes Out

The payday loan industry's pet bill died a quick death earlier tonight on the House floor. Many consumer groups revile the payday lenders, some of whom charge annual interest rates up to 700 percent. (And yet the industry claims it's not making enough profit. Go figure.) Rep. Dan Flynn (R-Van) barely had time to lay out his HB 846 before San Antonio Democrat Trey Martinez Fischer went for the bill's throat with three points of order. Talk about covering your bases. Speaker Tom Craddick sustained one of them. That finally kills HB 846, though its contents may yet be reincarnated as an amendment on another piece of legislation.

Said Martinez Fischer a few minutes after his point of order, "I commend Dan Flynn for trying to make the bill better. But the industry wouldn't budge. And I'm not up here to help industry."