Seven years after Arizona voters killed the payday loan industry in the state, a state House Committee will debate a bill to offer yet another form of high-interest loans. 

The measure voters rejected in 2008 would have allowed lenders a permanent exemption from the state’s 36 percent interest cap on loans. Now some of the backers of the payday loans want lawmakers to okay what are called flex loans.  In addition to the 36 percent maximum interest, those loans could have fees of half a percentage point a day. 

On a $3,000 loan that’s $15 a day, or $450 a month.  But state Rep. J.D. Mesnard thinks the fees are justified on the unsecured loans for people with poor credit,

“A small-dollar line of credit that you access if you need it, as you need it, pay it down as you can,” Mesnard said. “Generally it's $1,000, that's what we're talking, though $3,000 is the cap. It's a different animal. So it meets a different need.”

Jean Ann Fox of the Consumer Federation of America said while the effective interest rates are less than a payday loan, they still compute to a triple digit annualized rate.