Wendell “Bucky” Sebastian will retire on June 30 as executive director of the National Credit Union Foundation.

Sebastian has served at NCUF for almost exactly three years, from May 2010, after serving as CEO at Tampa, Fla.'s GTE FCU, now GTE Financial, for 20 years.

He has also been a key executive at NCUA and helped found Callahan & Associates, a noted credit union consulting firm. 

Sebastian has also been involved in helping to lead the National Center for Member Trust, an effort to help members whose credit unions contemplate becoming banks organize to retain their credit union charter.

In his earliest financial service career he held the position general counsel of the Illinois Department of Financial Institutions.

“Bucky has done an outstanding job over the last three years in directing the foundation to focus its efforts on financial education and a number of key initiatives to benefit the credit union movement,” said CUNA President/CEO Bill Cheney. “We will miss him and want to thank him for his many contributions to the foundation as well as the CUNA system.” The NCUF's board chair, Floridacentral CU CEO Laida Garcia, announced she will appoint a search committee to recruit for a successor.

“While we congratulate Bucky on his upcoming retirement, we also acknowledge the loss of an excellent leader, who will be greatly missed,” Garcia said. Sebastian served as NCUF executive director during a period where the NCUF moved into some new directions.  Sebastian was at the helm as the NCUF re-assumed responsibility for the Credit Union Development Education program, which has begun in the NCUF. 

He also helped oversee a shift in the foundation's grant making, moving away from funding more, smaller projects which might influence a small number of credit unions to funding larger projects which focused on putting innovations into place that credit unions across the country might be able to replicate in the future.