I'm a volunteer and official of a large credit union in Maryland. Our association held a multistate leadership conference in Ocean City several weeks ago. The conference led off on Saturday with a keynote address from NCUA Chairman Debbie Matz. Her topic was the corporate situation, where do we stand and where do we go. At one point she proclaimed that no taxpayer funds were or will be used in this, my term not hers, bail-out.

That struck me as odd since natural person credit unions are owned by taxpayers. At the end of her presentation I asked several questions, including why she was saying no taxpayer funds were used since my credit union had contributed $1.7 million to the stabilization fund this year, resulting in cutbacks in dividends and services to our members. This drew a round of applause from the attendees.

The chairman's response was that no one is forced to join a cooperative. I thought that was a strange response from the head of a government agency responsible for regulating cooperatives.