HOUSTON — Worried that larger credit unions may have hidden merger intentions, some smaller credit unions may be suspicious of their efforts to assist them.
Shirley Jenkins, who serves on the board of the $1 billion Municipal CU, expressed her frustration with the many attempts she and others have made to help smaller CUs in a number of areas.
"I've had so much resistance from smaller credit unions. When we come bearing gifts, I think there's this concern that they're going to be absorbed," Jenkins said during a session by Tawana James, director of NCUA's Office of Small Credit Union Initiatives, at the African American CU Coalition's conference today.
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James, who has long championed getting the word out to CUs with $10 million in assets or smaller that resources are available to them, said she can relate.
"I see a lot of small credit unions many times and that's a good thing," James said. "But the ones who might really need help, we just don't hear from them."
James said her office might consider adding the names of larger CUs to a list that economic development specialists could distribute to smaller CUs.
Collaborating with other smaller CUs may be an alternative. James said seven Pennsylvania CUs with a total of $19 million in assets partnered to secure $30,000 in grants and other resources to set up a multi-branded Web site and individual marketing plans.
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