WASHINGTON–With credit unions hiking the hills this week in conjunction with CUNA’s Governmental Affairs Conference, the Independent Community Bankers of America sent a two-page document to all 535 congressional offices urging them to ask hard questions of credit union reps.
The document is part of the ICBA’s ongoing “Wake Up” campaign, a broader effort to expand regulatory oversight and get Congress to reexamine the credit union tax exemption.
The ICBA document focuses on four areas on which it wants Congress to push back on credit unions:
- Credit union purchases of bank assets, which the banking trade groups have opposed, arguing banks can’t easily buy credit unions.
- Credit union involvement in big financial deals. The ICBA document cites, for example, a deal in which Pentagon FCU, Goldman Sachs and two other financial firms to back an $847 million loan to finance The Wharf project in Washington. The bankers want lawmakers to ask credit unions about how such deals help people of modest means.
- Credit union service to people of modest means, including low-income areas.
- NCUA’s new subordinated debt proposal. The bank group wants questions asked around whether CUs will be using the funds to buy banks and whether it’s also a threat to the cooperative model.