Byron Dorgan: “We see the opportunity to borrow money at 4 percent for 30 years as a gift from the American people. These people were…”

“We see the opportunity to borrow money at 4 percent for 30 years as a gift from the American people. These people were inundated with water, in deep trouble, and the Federal Government said: We are here to help you. Let's give you a helping hand to get you back on your feet. Nobody was going to make our community whole overnight, but these loans over 30 years, would go a long way in helping. Then he describes his need to have flexibility to purchase additional assets and the difficulty he has had trying to negotiate with the company that purchased the loan. They have simply said: No dice. No way. What he is saying is that he has been handcuffed by this process. He had no idea that would be the case. He had no idea the SBA would sell his disaster loan to a private company that won't allow him to transfer a lien as the SBA has almost always done to disaster victims. I tell these stories only to say there is something wrong with this process. We ought not sell disaster loans. We simply should not do that. The SBA should service those loans and do so in a thoughtful and rational way. Let's not sell those loans.”