Washington Department of Financial Institutions Earns Bank, Mortgage Accreditation
Washington, D.C. — The Conference of State Bank Supervisors (CSBS) and the American Association of Residential Mortgage Regulators (AARMR) are pleased to present the Washington Department of Financial Institutions (Department or DFI) with CSBS Banking Accreditation and CSBS/AARMR Mortgage Accreditation. These reaccreditations certify that the DFI maintains the highest standards in banking and mortgage supervision. Scott Jarvis serves as Director of the Washington Department of Financial Institutions.
“Congratulations to Director Jarvis and his entire staff for achieving banking reaccreditation,” said CSBS President and CEO John W. Ryan. “This accreditation demonstrates the constant commitment of the DFI to maintaining top-notch standards in financial services supervision.”
“Congratulations to our colleagues in Washington,” said Tony Florence, President of AARMR and Director of Mortgage Examinations at the Texas Department of Savings and Mortgage Lending. “By receiving this mortgage accreditation, the Washington Department of Financial Institutions has shown its commitment to exceptional supervision of the state’s residential mortgage industry.”
“Washington DFI is proud of our re-accreditation process and results — especially in light of how challenging the CSBS accreditation standards are,” DFI Director Scott Jarvis said. “Staff works hard to ensure the agency meets – and often exceeds – the regulatory standards set for the banking and mortgage industries.”
The CSBS Accreditation Program involves a comprehensive review of the critical elements that assure a department’s ability to discharge its responsibilities. This is done through an investigation of all department operations including administration and finance, personnel, training, examination, supervision, and legislative powers. The high standards set by the CSBS Accreditation Program support CSBS’s public interest goals by encouraging state banking and mortgage departments to enhance their capability to promote safe and sound financial services with a minimum of regulatory burden and cost, and by identifying highly competent state banking and mortgage departments.
To achieve mortgage accreditation, state agencies must undergo a voluntary comprehensive review by the CSBS and AARMR accreditation team. The accreditation process begins with the completion of an extensive self-evaluation questionnaire on all department operations, including administration and finance, personnel, training, examination, supervision, and legislative powers. An external review team comprised of veteran state regulators then performs an on-site review and presents its findings to an audit team and to the Performance Standards Committee. The members then vote on the reports of the review team and the audit team.
The CSBS Accreditation Program seeks to strengthen state banking and mortgage departments and to demonstrate the high quality of state banking and mortgage departments to the public, federal banking agencies, Congress and other state agencies.
More information on the CSBS Accreditation Program is available here.
# # #
Media Contacts:
Matthew Longacre, Manager of Communications, 
About CSBS
The Conference of State Bank Supervisors (CSBS) is the nationwide organization of banking regulators from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. State banking regulators supervise approximately 4,850 state?chartered financial institutions. Further, most state banking departments also regulate a variety of non-bank financial services providers, including mortgage lenders. For more than a century, CSBS has given state supervisors a national forum to coordinate supervision of their regulated entities and to develop regulatory policy. CSBS also provides training to state banking and financial regulators and represents its members before Congress and the federal financial regulatory agencies.
