WASHINGTON - With this summer's Republican and Democratic conventions posing choice opportunities for CUNA to ply its post-H.R. 1151 grand strategy of educating the nation's political class in the credit union difference, CUNA, CUNA Mutual, and the California and Pennsylvania Credit Union Leagues are linking up as a lobbying SWAT team to make the most of the occasions. "We were really planning on moving everything up a notch in terms of our presence," said CUNA Vice President of Political Action and Grassroots Richard Gose, "moving it to the national level-and the conventions offered a perfect opportunity." Flanked by a cadre of co-workers involved in the effort-CUNA Senior Legislative Counsel Gary Kohn, Political Affairs Manager Karen Ward, Grassroots Manager Gretchen Graf, and Pennsylvania CUL Associate Vice President for Government Affairs Pat Raymond (California CUL President Dave Chatfield was in transit)-Gose then outlined an interleaving CUNA convention strategy designed to parlay the CU system's cooperative synergies into enhanced public relations outcomes that would be prohibitively costly if purchased outright. Headlining the extended program (the convention team has already hosted receptions in Philadelphia and Los Angeles for 80 Republican and 120 Democratic convention committee staffers respectively in order to cultivate this administratively important group) will be gala VIP receptions in each of the convention cities honoring public officials who have distinguished themselves in CU matters. Honorees currently scheduled for the Republican Convention are Sen. Larry Craig (Idaho), Rep. Bob Ney (Ohio), and NCUA Board member Dennis Dollar; while Sen. Joe Lieberman (Conn.), Rep. Stenny Hoyer (Md.), and, tentatively, NCUA Board member Yolanda Wheat are slated for awards at the Democratic Convention. The event, as envisioned by the convention team, will feature guests from across party and CU spectra-including state and national delegations, party and convention officials, league and CU representatives, and, perhaps most important of all, convention delegates who are also credit union members-in one teeming corroboree of CU merry-making and consciousness-raising. "Each one of the leagues will receive a number of invitations that they can then use to invite their members of Congress to come," Kohn elaborated, noting that, in the past, CUNA had limited its two-city convention program to a single reception for one of the smaller congressional delegations, "because the attendees of these are going to be delegates who happen to also be credit union members." With this remark Kohn revealed one of the major cooperative thrusts of the convention team's plan-and a recent CUNA shift away from grooming convention delegates out of credit union whole cloth to identifying delegates who are CU members. "When we first started talking about becoming more involved in the convention," Gose explained, "we talked about getting (CU members) elected (as delegates). When you start looking at the level of credit union activism in the political arena, however...it really made more sense to start focusing on the conventions themselves and trying to identify the delegates that are credit union members, than trying to get (people) to run...." CUNA believes that, of the thousands of Republican and Democratic delegates respectively in Philadelphia July 31-Aug 3 and in Los Angeles August 14-17, a large percentage of them will be credit union members who would be receptive to convention team invitations and overtures. Once this important credit union bloc is finally identified, Gose and Kohn indicated, it will figure broadly in the team's overall plans. But the team's plans call for more than just swanky if useful partying and hobnobbing at opposite ends of the country. In addition to a series of issues briefings and working breakfasts in convention cities for the CU-leaning delegate groups and key politicians, each convention program will also feature marquee community outreach events designed to highlight credit unions' "people helping people" raison d'etre. "What we've had the opportunity of getting involved with in Philadelphia, along with the league," explained Gose, "is the Habitat for Humanity....We're working on the 2000 Republican Convention House there....The convention basically asked someone to help come in and sponsor (it)....It's one of those things that's almost tailor-made for credit unions because it went to the whole philosophy of credit unions." "We've joined with CUNA, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac as financial supporters of the project," added Raymond, "and (between) the Pennsylvania Credit Union League and CUNA we've provided over 50 volunteers who have gone down and worked on the house each for a full day." The house, which is one of 26,000 abandoned structures in the Philadelphia area, according to Raymond, was 80% refurbished with CU volunteer help. It soon will be transferred, she said, under a no-interest mortgage to a single mother with a nine-year-old son. As for Los Angeles, the team's outreach event there is being designed around a presentation by the National Endowment for Financial Education (NEFE)-the private educational foundation that CUNA recently teamed up with to promote teen financial literacy throughout the United States-to showcase a portion of NEFE's High School Financial Planning Program at an area community development credit union and a local school. Additionally, the Los Angeles team is in the process of enticing L.A.-area CU members to volunteer as workers at the convention, and, toward this end, so far has secured 50 out of a target number of 200 volunteers. "We're excited about that," said Ward, referring to the omnipresent convention workers, who, she said, would also just happen to have credit union pins to wear, "just have those folks around at the convention." Loathe to miss any opportunity where CU interests could be touted, the convention team, Kohn said, also is "in communication" with people on both parties' platform committees. He added, however, that there was no reason to be concerned about the insertion of a CU-unfriendly plank in either party's platform. And as far-fetched as such an eventuality might seem, it would even be less likely in the case of the Democratic platform committee where California CUL President Dave Chatfield-and one other California CU member-is a member. "I think it's pretty good that we can increase the visibility and involvement of credit unions at major conventions," said Chatfield, who added that the California CUL would also be hosting events for its Republican congressional delegation in Philadelphia. "It's appropriate for us to do that. It's not something that we've been a part of in the past, but it's the right time to (do so now)." Gose, a major architect of the convention plan, couldn't agree with Chatfield more. "Simply put, we can't compete with all the Sun Oils and the dot.coms (of the field)," he explained. "But we have tried to take a very smart approach to what we're doing....We pool our resources together (and) use the power of the system-CUNA, the leagues, and credit unions-and bring it all together to find those special niches that work....We're kind of built around those unique opportunities and are playing to our strengths. We've got people, and that's what we're bringing to bear." -
gmcorrigan@mindspring.com
