WASHINGTON – Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed was one of 19 senators who signed a letter urging Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to require banks and other lenders to participate in the Obama administration’s foreclosure prevention programs and help qualified homeowners seeking assistance.

“In order to stabilize the economy we need to stabilize the housing market,” said Reed, a senior member of the Senate Banking Committee. “Companies that have agreed to participate in the administration’s foreclosure prevention programs must be held accountable, especially when they are simultaneously receiving taxpayer dollars.

He added: “Homeowners who are looking to get help before it’s too late should not have to wait two months to receive an answer to their questions. The administration must keep pushing to ensure that [lenders’] public pronouncements translate into relief for homeowners.”

According to a statement from Reed’s office, a recent report from the National Foreclosure Mitigation Counseling Program says homeowners are waiting an average of 45 to 60 days for responses to help requests.

Other homeowners have found lenders reluctant to make meaningful changes to mortgage terms despite saying they are taking part in foreclosure prevention initiatives.

Reed recently raised this issue with the Treasury’s Assistant Secretary for Financial Stability Herbert M. Allison Jr. Reed said he urged the Treasury to consider collecting data on the volume of homeowner inquiries, average response time, and number and type of workouts offered.

The senators also said they are concerned about the large number of option adjustable rate mortgages scheduled to reset in the next four years.

“Without servicers taking proactive steps to reach these homeowners and careful vigilance on the part of the Department of Treasury and others to ensure that outreach translates into real relief, efforts to stabilize the housing market could be undermined,” the senators wrote. “In addition to the outreach that [lenders] may be doing to contact homeowners with option ARMs, what assurances have the U.S. Department of Treasury and its agents received that [lenders] are developing the capacity to respond to the potential onslaught of requests for modifications?”