The $1.5 billion United Federal Credit Union in St. Joseph, Mich., said it islaunching a multi-phase building project to support its plannedgrowth over the next five years.

The first phase includes construction of a new,20,000-square-foot operations center in Niles, Mich.

“While our corporate headquarters will remain in St. Joseph, ournew operations center and the follow-on building projects that weare planning throughout Berrien County will help us expand ourcapabilities,” said UFCU President/CEO Gary Easterling. “Havingseveral sizable work locations throughout the county will also helpus attract talented employees that live throughout the Michianaarea.”

Easterling said that after reviewing more than 40 developmentproposals, it became apparent that having several modular campuses– rather than a single, large headquarters building – was the bestapproach because it would enable the cooperative to remain flexibleand adapt to changing market conditions.

Construction of the operations center will begin in Decemberwith an anticipated completion date of December 2014.

“In addition to our new operations center, we'll continue toinvest in southwest Michigan, even as we grow throughout thecommunities we serve across the U.S.,” said Easterling. “Forexample, United just opened a new, state-of-the-art employeetraining center here in St. Joseph. We repurposed an unused,former branch location and invested $750,000 to create the newlyrenovated educational facility, which held its first training classon Sept. 9.”

Easterling also noted that UFCU's existing corporate headquarters and branch facility willbenefit from renovation investments of more than $3 million plannedfor 2014.

The existing branch will be replaced by a new building on thesame property and the corporate headquarters will be expanded andimproved to house UFCU's growing workforce.

UFCU said it now serves more than 121,000 members through 23branches in Arkansas, Indiana, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina andOhio.