WASHINGTON — When National Association of Community Credit Unions Executive Director Marc Selvitelli said he would be leaving the organization in February of this year for another opportunity, NACCU had to rethink its purpose and even its existence.
NACCU Chairman Marcus Schaefer, president and CEO of Truliant Federal Credit Union, made the announcement during a membership luncheon held at the association's annual meeting going on last week in Las Vegas. After deliberation, he said the NACCU Board voted unanimously for the recommendation and that "NACCU and CUNA now share the same purpose to promote, support, represent, serve and improve the business conditions and common interests of community credit unions." A full membership vote will take place later this year.
CUNA will be assuming NACCU's activities. The largest credit union trade association has agreed to name four members of the NACCU board to a CUNA committee addressing community credit unions, continue the annual community credit union conference, continue the Community Credit Union of the Year award, and develop white papers and events specific to community credit unions.
"It's difficult to realize the purpose of an organization is no longer there–not really no longer there but is being served as well, if not better, by another group," Schaefer explained. He said he talked with many of the founding members and they agreed.
"NACCU was formed in '99 in recognition that while CUNA did a good job representing all credit unions, there was no focus on community credit unions," he added. NACCU organized an annual conference that provided networking and learning experiences geared toward community charters covering topics like marketing to an entire community and handling name changes.
However, with recent litigation from bankers' groups and legislative and regulatory wrangling over community charters, the issues have been pushed to the forefront at CUNA. Schaefer said it was time to re-evaluate the group's position before committing to a new executive director. Instead of traveling that road, the board decided to work with CUNA to ensure community charters continued to have a voice. "We wanted to make sure there was nothing we were doing that CUNA wasn't going to pick up," he said.
Schaefer also pointed out that credit unions had to be a member of CUNA and their state league to join NACCU and in a time of compressed margins, belonging to two trade associations–after CUNA had picked up the ball on community charter issues–did not make sense. He admitted that NACCU membership growth had "not been spectacular"; the group has about 130 members Schaefer said of 1,148 federally insured community chartered credit unions nationwide, according to NCUA.
Even with community credit unions being stripped of their ability to adopt underserved areas, NACCU was not able to garner a lot of new membership. "Having it all back in one bucket, [community credit unions] will have a lot more resources," Schaefer said. "It's not like a NAFCU. Federal credit unions from time to time do have different issues." NACCU has been looking to commission a study of the harm done to communities by denying underserved areas to community charters, but he is unsure whether that will come out before the group dissolves.
The data collection NCUA recently completed could also be particularly poignant for community credit unions even though NCUA Board Member Gigi Hyland told the group at its annual meeting that the agency will work to put the findings into context. Schaefer said that community charters take time to penetrate and after a few years, reaching a double-digit percentage is a good pace, but others may choose not to interpret it that way. He also emphasized that his credit union, prior to converting to a community charter a few years back, served a number of employee groups–individuals who were employed, so despite their community charter most members are employed. –scooke@cutimes.com
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