WASHINGTON –NCUA has filed its brief in its appeal of a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit on its field of membership proposal.
At issue is a lawsuit filed by the American Bankers Association in December of 2016 that challenged its proposed expansion of FOM rules.
As CUToday.info reported, in March of this year the district court upheld two portions of the law challenged by the bankers’ group, but also struck down two provisions. The court ruled the provisions that exceeded the NCUA's statutory authority include those that automatically qualify a core-based statistical area with fewer than 2.5 million people to be a local community and raise the population limit for rural districts to one-million people.
NAFCU, CUNA and CUNA Mutual Group all filed an amicus brief supporting NCUA's FOM rule in June of 2017.Now the agency has filed its brief as it appeals the ruling.
NAFCU issued a statement saying it continues to support the FOM provisions as approved by the agency.
"NAFCU remains a staunch advocate of the NCUA's legal authority to modernize credit unions' fields of membership, and we strongly support the NCUA during this appeal process," said NAFCU President and CEO Dan Bergerin a statement. "We will continue to support the agency's efforts to keep credit unions competitive and allow them to grow, and will be filing an amicus brief to support the NCUA in the FOM lawsuit."