As National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Union members met lawmakers and their staffs this week, the Independent Community Bankers of America circulated a crib sheet on Capitol Hill designed to make the credit union officials squirm.
The vice chairman of the Independent Community Bankers of America is urging small credit unions to declare war on large credit unions.
In a recent post on the online publishing platform Medium, Brad Bolton accuses the National Credit Union Administration of adopting rules that favor large credit unions over smaller institutions, including community banks. And he is encouraging the small institutions to revolt against such decisions and join community bankers in demanding congressional investigations into the NCUA’s decisions.
A new NCUA policy on counting servicemembers in determining whether a credit union is” low-income” is an illegal expansion of the limits Congress has placed on the institutions, the Independent Community Bankers of America charged Thursday.
“The NCUA’s changes–made without a formal rule subject to public review and comment–is another example of this captive regulator expanding the powers of credit unions well beyond the limits established by Congress to justify their tax exemption,” ICBA President/CEO Rebeca Romero Rainey said.
The NCUA will now count military personnel in determining whether a credit union qualifies for the agency’s low-income designation.