Looking back six years ago finds 11 Utah credit unions filing acounter suit against the Utah Bankers Association seeking $1.5billion in damages. The damages represent the losses the creditunions would collectively suffer if the UBA should succeed in itseffort to restrict credit union membership only to the county inwhich the CU is based. “Banks have benefited from those field ofmembership expansions, but now are asking credit unions to be shutout and restricted in the future. That's not right. These creditunions have valid fields of membership according to their charterand the law in this state. These FOMs were approved by the bankingcommissioner,” said Bruce Richards, the attorney for the CUs.According to Richards, if bankers are granted the injunctive reliefthey are seeking, they must restore credit unions to their originalstatus quo. That issue also marks a flurry of other state suitsfiled by bankers over CU membership expansion in Colorado, Maine,Montana and Texas. In addition, the credit union movement waswaiting for the Supreme Court's ruling in the landmark AT&TFamily case.