New York State Senator Zellnor Myrie has introduced new legislation to impose consistent standards on foreclosure auction sales following a New York Focus and Gothamist investigation into widespread irregularities that can cost former homeowners thousands of dollars while boosting lenders’ profits.

The investigation, which was based on interviews and an independent review of thousands of state court records, found some lenders, their attorneys and court-appointed referees routinely used a disputed calculation method to increase debts owed by former homeowners following foreclosure sales. The method, which charges interest on top of interest, contradicts state court system guidance. Former homeowners allege in federal lawsuits that the practice also violates a state law prohibiting compound interest on residential loans and has gone unchecked by judges, referees and state court officials.

After a year of walking back its major climate commitments, New York moved an inch forward on Monday, when the Department of Environmental Conservation finalized rules to guide how major polluters report their greenhouse gas emissions.

Governor Kathy Hochul’s administration announced the rules just after filing an appeal last week in a lawsuit brought by climate groups over her decision to shelve an ambitious carbon pricing program, called “cap and invest,” earlier this year. She’d once described the program as a cornerstone of her climate agenda, but the DEC’s reporting rules now look like all that remain of it.