NEW YORK CITY — The Federation, the shorter (and more to the point) name for the National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions, has seen some hard times, admits Executive Director Cliff Rosenthal, but like the Broadway song, "I'm still here" (from "Follies") it has rolled along, racking up accomplishments and defying doubters.

Early last week NCUA Board Chairwoman JoAnn Johnson attended the Federation's 6th Annual Financial Literacy Day: Best Practices Forum at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, the first time the event has been held outside New York City. The more than 100 attendees viewed the 17-minute High Definition video of the Federation's successfully brokered partnerships between large and small credit unions.

Titled Credit Union Partnerships: Building Bridges to the Underserved, the video documents the partnership between the $4.3 billion in assets Patelco CU and two San Francisco CDCUs, Mission Area FCU and Northeast Community FCU. An earlier, pre-edited version was shown during NAFCU's conference in Hawaii, said Rosenthal, but this version is the final cut. In it, Andy Hunter, CEO of Patelco says that he doesn't just believe in the cooperative approach among credit unions, but that it would be "arrogant" to think that large CUs can serve underserved populations better just because